Moon Trek III What Goes Around
by ewink
Summary: Having recovered from their last ordeal, Ranma and crew find themselves once again at the farthest reaches of the galaxy. All is going well until the come in contact with the new and improved Kuno collective. And they are out for revenge. Elsewhere, a Fed
1. Prelude

PRELUDE 

It's a beautiful day out on the planet Zima 3, in the far reaches of the alpha quadrant. The sun is shining; there isn't a cloud in the sky. The weatherman has predicted the next eleven days to be exactly the same.

A lot of the inhabitants of Zima 3 are taking advantage of the weather. The beaches are full of half naked men and women. Kids are playing in the baseball park. Old ladies are feeding the pidgins. Old men are playing chess. No one seemed to have a care in the world.

Even the police are out basking in the sun. They don't have much to do. With weather like this, who could possibly think of committing a crime?

"I can't stand this fucking weather." A man with an Australian accent says to no one but himself.

The man is a tall man with a dark goatee. He's wearing jeans and a black button up shirt with a blue tie. He's got his sleeves rolled up and his tie loosened. He has mirrored sunglasses on and his head is shaved. His name is Trevor Watts.

Trevor looks around the area. He sees all the happy people and the cheerfulness. It makes him sick.

Trevor looks at the young people in love. They all seem to walk past him, silently mocking him with their slurps and kisses. It seems that each slurp sounds like it's actually saying something.

_Loser._

Trevor shakes his head and decides that at least one of these people is going to be as miserable as him. He sticks his foot out as a young man comes walking by. The young man trips, but catches his balance before he hits the ground. He turns back to mister cynical.

"I'm sorry!" The young man says. "I should watch where I'm going."

The young man then bounds off, in what seems like an even better mood than he was in before he tripped. Trevor can just scream.

"WHY DO YOU PEOPLE HAVE TO BE SO HAPPY?"

A young lady walks up to Trevor.

"I'm not happy." She tells him.

"You're not?" Trevor giggles.

"No sir. My boyfriend was supposed to meet me here. He said he had great news for me. I think he was going to ask me to marry him,"

"But he stood you up?" Trevor asked, trying very hard to restrain his glee.

"It would appear so." She answered, on the verge of tears.

Trevor was about to do his happy dance, which is actually quite cute, when a man comes running up to the girl.

"I'm so sorry baby! I thought you wanted to meet at the tea house! Not the T-intersection!" he says.

Trevor just rolls his eyes as he begins to walk away. He halts though when he heard the girl scream one of those happy screams. He turns.

"I will marry you!" She spouts. "And not just because you just won the lottery!"

Trevor clenches a fist and walks down the street.

"When, oh when will the Gods decide it's time for I to have a girlfriend?" Trevor ponders out loud as he walks.

"I'm a stud muffin! I should have fifteen girls! But no, I can't even get one! My mother even turned me down for prom!"

Trevor sighed as he walked past an arcade where a couple inside are too busy making out to pay attention to their game. Trevor continues down the street.

"And now here I am, stuck on THIS planet of all planets." He reminds himself. "Blasted Klingon repair shops!"

Trevor turns his head while continuing to walk and he sees a store that teaches martial arts. However no one inside is fighting. Trevor can only sigh once again when he notices all inside are busy making out with each other.

Trevor continues his rambling. "I deserve happiness! I deserve to be at peace! I helped save this quadrant from the Dominion! I took a disrupter to the ass! Got the Starfleet Purple Heart! And for my discharge what do I get? A crap-ass, non-working P-O-S Runabout."

A beeping emanates from Trevor's pocket. He pulls out his communicator. It looks like an old school Starfleet communicator. You know, the flip open, beam me up Scotty kind.

Trevor flips it open. "Computer, report."

The computer begins to talk to him. It's not the normal Starfleet computer voice though. This computer has the voice of someone very familiar. Someone with what could be described as having an English accent.

"Trevor, a Starfleet ship has entered the sector!"

Could something right actually be happening today? "Are the responding to the distress call?"

"Trevor, I told you the communications array was offline. I could not transmit the distress call."

Guess not. "Will it be fixed before they leave the sector?"

"It should be! I am trying 10 EPS re-routs per minute! I will eventually get it to work!" The computer replies.

"Very well. Can you identify the ship?"

"The best I can do..." The computer explains. "...is the class. It's a Sovereign Class."

"Thanks." Trevor closes his communicator.

He continues to walk down the street. He starts to feel hungry so he decides to go and get some food. He was able to replicate the local currency before he left his disabled runabout.

"Let's see, pasta or fish. What do I feel like today? I think that my lonely heart could use some Alfredo sauce!" Trevor begins to walk across the street when a police officer yells at him.

"Excuse me sir!" The officer says, running up to Trevor.

"Yeah?"

"I am afraid that I am going to have to place you under arrest."

"WHAT?" Trevor screamed. "Why? What did I do? I have the green light!" Trevor franticly points to the traffic light, which at that exact moment turns red. Trevor scowls.

"No, sir, we have to arrest people who talk to themselves. It's a mental health guideline."

"I wasn't talking to myself." Trevor explains. "It was a soliloquy."

The policeman laughs. "No sir, I am a literature major and that was not a soliloquy. At best that was haiku."

"Well, that's what it was then. A haiku."

"Haiku's are illegal also sir."

Trevor just groans in submission as the policeman places him in handcuffs.

"You must hate having to work on a nice day like this, huh?" Trevor asks the officer.

"No sir. I love my job!" The happy policeman states.

Trevor groans again. "Well, do you guys at least have pasta at the jail?"

"Yes sir! All you can eat!"

Trevor grins as he is placed in the back of a police car.

"Unfortunately – "The cop finishes as he shuts the door and gets into the drivers seat. "You are not going to jail. You are going to the mental health building downtown. You can get SPAM sandwiches there!"

Trevor just cries as he bangs his head against the prisoner partition of the police car.

**A COOL, SEMI PLAGIARIZED STAR TREK TYPE THEME SHOULD BE INSERTED HERE, THIS TIME ONE WITH WORDS LIKE ON ENTERPRISE! THAT SONG KICKS ARSE!**

_**IT'S BEEN A LONG ROAD GETTING FROM DENNY'S TO HERE...**_

_**IT'S BEEN A LONG TIME BUT MY CHICKEN STRIPS ARE FINALLY NEAR...**_

_**I CAN TASTE THE CHANGE IN THE TEA RIGHT NOW**_

_**GOSNELL'S IN MY WAY**_

_**BUT HE'S NOT GOING TO KEEP ME DOWN NO MORE**_

_**NO I'M GONNA USE EQUAL**_

_**CAUSE I GOT LUNA TO MY RIGHT**_

_**GETTING THE EQUAL FOR ME**_

_**I'VE LUNA TO HELP ME**_

_**I CAN SWEETEN ANYTHING...**_

Space. Final frontier. Shampoo XO of starship Sisko. Starship mission: to go where no one go before, to kill Akane Tendo, and to have Ranma all to Shampoo - HEY THAT'S NOT HOW IT GOES! - WO AI NI!!!


	2. Status

CHAPTER ONE: STATUS 

_Captain's Log: Stardate 60144.0. Once again we have been stuck out in the middle of nowhere. I have come to the conclusion that they have no real work they want us to do, so they just stick us with busy work. It's hard to believe that with all that's gone on in the past three months that they would stick us out here. This crew has more than proved it's self to Starfleet Command. I think that maybe Admiral Happosai just wants me as far away as possible so that he will be free to steal underwear._

"He still steals underwear?" A naked Akane asks.

Ranma grins and kisses his wife on the back of the head.

Ranma is sitting up in his bed making his log entry. Akane is lying up against him, with her head on his chiseled chest.

"I am sure he does." Ranma acknowledges. "I heard on the Federation News Service that the Victoria's Secret warehouse on Titan was burglarized and emptied out completely. Only one person I know of could possibly have done that."

Akane nodded slightly as she adjusted herself so she'd be more comfortable.

"It's got to be even easier for him now that he has the entire 16th fleet at his disposal!"

Akane murmured. "Aren't we in the 16th fleet?"

Ranma smacked his forehead. "D'oh!"

Akane laughed at her husband as he continued with his log.

_Our new Chief of Security has adjusted well to her position. She has the security officers running like finely turned machines. She also got all of the new officers that boarded at Starbase 445 trained in record time. Commander Shampoo took some time to adjust to the change, but the two of them get along great now._

"That's because they're both nuts!" Akane giggled.

"Akane!" Ranma scolded. "They may be a little-"Ranma paused to find the right words. "-eccentric and maybe a bit high strung, but nuts is such a harsh term to use!"

Akane shrugged. "As Chief Medical Officer it's my word to use on whomever I please." Akane grinned and yawned. "Aren't you done yet? I'm still tired."

"Almost." Ranma stated and then continued with his log.

_My helmsman, on the other hand, seems to have gotten worse. Ever since the incident in the torpedo tube – what he was doing in torpedo control naked is anyone's guess – he has been very quiet and very distracted._

"I haven't noticed anything different about him." Akane chimed.

"Really?" Ranma asked. "You should see him on the bridge. He won't say anything, he won't even look at Mina –"

Ranma cut himself off. Akane sat up.

"You don't think -?" Akane asked.

Ranma's eyes narrowed. "That would explain why she glares at him every day."

"Glares?" Akane asked.

"Yeah, one almost as evil as yours!" Ranma replied. Akane quickly responded with a fist to the nose, followed by a glare. "Yeah, that one." Ranma murmured.

Akane laughed. "When do you think it happened?"

"After the wedding – Lita and Gosnell's – is when I noticed the change." Ranma started to laugh.

"What?" Akane asked.

"She threw him out of her quarters naked! That's why he was running around the ship nude!" Ranma started to tear up he was laughing so hard.

"That wasn't nice." Akane scowled at the thought of Mina chucking poor Ryouga out into the hallway with nothing but his birthday suit.

Ranma eyed the dark haired girl. "What would you do if you found a naked Ryouga in your bed?"

Akane's eyes shot wide open at that thought. "Eww."

Ranma began to laugh again. Akane covered her mouth and turned and hit Ranma once again. "That wasn't nice!" She said.

Ranma continued to laugh. "I'm not the one who said 'eww'!"

Akane just grumbled and turned towards the window and closed her eyes. "Hurry up and finish that damned log."

Ranma giggled a few more times and continued.

_Ryouga has nothing to worry about though. Everyone loves him and his antics. This will pass in time. I do have to say that I hope Commander Aino got her shot. I'm not sure if the quadrant is ready for another Ryouga. _

Ranma grunted as the elbow of Akane impacted his ribs. He took the hint and quickly finished.

_Other than that, all is good. Looking forward to another exciting day of doing nothing tomorrow._

"End log." Ranma stated. The computer chirped. "Set wake up time for 0700."

The computer chirped in compliance and Ranma rolled over wrapped his arm around his wife, kissed her once, and fell fast asleep.

"I AM NOT AVOIDING YOU!" Ryouga yelled.

Mina just continued to glare at him. "I'm late. The shot may not have worked. You need to be a man and do the right thing."

"What? Marry you?" Ryouga asked.

"Don't be a moron." Mina scowled. "Deposit one third of your paycheck into my account."

"ONE THIRD?" Ryouga screamed again. Several of the other patrons in ten forward looked towards the pair, but one look from Mina changed the direction of their stares.

"It's the least you could do, considering you got me drunk, seduced me, and knocked me up." Mina stated dryly.

"I DID NOT SEDUCE YOU!" Ryouga yelled, this time flailing his arms. The patrons of the bar again looked in their direction but this time it was Ryouga's look that got them to turn away.

"Well, there is no other reason I would sleep with a subordinate, ENSIGN." Mina stated quite matter of factly.

Ryouga lowered his eyes and grinned ever so slightly. "So, you're saying that if we were the same rank you might go out with me?"

Mina was thrown off by this question.

"Maybe."

Ryouga's grin widened. "See, I didn't seduce you. You wanted it. You wanted some of this all along. Big poppa Ryouga was on your mind from the very beginning."

Mina promptly sent Ryouga flying across the room and walked out. Ryouga simply lied on the floor and laughed.

He stopped though when he realized the exact reality of the situation. He couldn't afford a child. What if she was pregnant? They couldn't tell for sure yet though. The shot always messes with a woman's cycle. She could simply be late as a side effect of the shot.

Ryouga sat up and groaned. He was going to have to get her into sickbay for a test. He knew that she didn't want to though. She didn't want any chance in anyone knowing that she slept with him. He wasn't sure why though. Just looking around ten-forward Ryouga determined that she could do worse. A lot worse.

Ryouga also acknowledged to himself that he really didn't want Akane knowing that he had slept with her. She'd never want him if she was just going to be his sloppy seconds. The pig-boy sighed, stood and walked out of the ships watering hole.

Behind the bar, Gosnell was laughing. His wife, Commander Lita Gosnell, was sitting across from him. The pair watches Ryouga leave the room.

"Naked you say?" Gosnell asked.

"Yup." Lita replied. "I wasn't working yet at the time but from what I heard he was kicked out of her quarters-"

"Naked?" Gosnell asked.

"Yes, naked." Lita confirmed somewhat annoyed. "Then he got lost and was wandering around the ship."

"Naked." Gosnell stated. Lita smacked him with a menu.

"He was in engineering, shuttle bay seven, and then ended up in torpedo control."

"Ah yes. Where he got-"

Lita smiled. "Stuck. Yeah."

Gosnell just laughed again. "You know, I haven't known that guy long but I gotta tell you. I love him! Comedy relief of the ship."

Lita nodded. She shoved her glass across the bar. Gosnell filled it up with a bubbly green colored liquid.

"What is this again?" Lita asked, taking a drink.

"It's called Mountain Dew." Gosnell stated. "It's become very rare ever since the great sugar prohibition of 2204."

"I like it! It's woken me up quite a bit!" Lita giggled, pushing her now empty glass back to her husband.

"Now, now. I don't think you need much more. This stuff will make you wired and that's never good for someone with their finger on the proverbial trigger." Gosnell explain, taking her glass away and giving her some water.

"Bah!" Lita groaned.

Lita spins on her bar stool for a couple of turns as her husband walks away. Lita's been very happy the last two months. She's gotten married, gotten a new job, and gotten to see Ryouga's mini P-Chan pulled from a torpedo exhaust intake valve.

She wasn't working at the time, as she said, but when she heard what was going on she HAD to go see it.

_Yeah_, she smiled to her self, _life doesn't get much better._

It doesn't take much though for her to remember back to the worse times though. Back to when she thought she was happy. Back when she was robbing, stealing, and shooting.

Lita sighs and shakes off the memory. They have been coming back to her in greater frequency lately, but she hasn't really thought anything of it.

The double doors to ten-forward hiss open. Lita spins around a couple of times more and looks towards the doors. (Lita really likes to spin in her chair!) She hops off and smiles when she sees who enters.

"Good morning! Li-Li!" Serena smiles.

Lita gives her friend a hug. The pair sits down at the bar. Lita sternly looks at Serena.

"You know I hate it when you call me Li-Li."

Serena giggles. "You don't hate it when Gosnell calls you Li-Li."

Gosnell turns to the girls upon hearing his voice. "Huh?" Lita grins at her husband and smacks the top of his head with a newspaper that was conveniently left in the next seat. Gosnell sobs.

"WHAT?!" He whines.

"Don't call me Li-Li." Lita grins.

"Yes ma'am." Gosnell salutes. Lita swings at Gosnell again, but he avoids it and smiles at Serena.

"GOOD MORNING!" Serena yells.

Gosnell flips over backwards and falls to the floor. He slowly gets back up and groans.

"Uh, good morning, Commander. You seem very perky this morning."

Serena giggles. "I had a great sleep last night. I got me something that I have needed for quite a while!"

It's Lita who falls out of her seat this time. "You don't mean-?" She whimpers from the deck.

"I do." Serena giggles. (Insert semi-dramatic pause here!) "My new Cat Girl Nuku Nuku comic!"

Lita, who had just managed to get back to her seat, falls out of it once again and Gosnell tumbles over. Gosnell is the first to recover.

"That's great, Commander. Would you like your usual?" Gosnell grins.

"Yes please!" Serena grins.

Gosnell nods and walks away. Lita gets back up and returns to her seat.

"So how's work, Serena?" Lita asks.

Serena sighs. "It's okay. I haven't caused any explosions." Serena hangs her head. "This week."

Lita pats her friend on the back. Gosnell returns with a bowl. He places it in front of Serena. He then pulls out a box of Lucky Charms. He pours them in the bowl, and then pours some milk on it.

Serena grins. "Thank you!"

Gosnell nods and walks off to tend to the other customers. Serena starts to chomp on her cereal. She's had a decent couple of months as well. She hasn't caused any accidents that have required major evacuations. She's gotten new quarters after hers caught fire while she was in the shower. Seems she left her curling iron sitting atop her paper towel collection.

On an additional note Serena now takes a towel into the shower with her. She was quite embarrassed walking out of the shower, naked of course, and into a room full of firefighters and security personal.

Serena takes another spoon full of her cereal and looks around. She doesn't see Mina, but that's understandable. She starts work an hour earlier than Serena. She also doesn't see Raye. That doesn't surprise her either.

Raye has kept to herself since the events that led to her killing her first and only love.

Raye's quarters are completely dark. The only light coming in is from the running light, annoyingly placed right outside of her deck four quarters.

A beeping noise starts. Some glass is heard shattering and then the beeping stops.

"Shit." Raye mumbles. "Lights!"

The room illuminates. Raye's quarters are trashed. There are clothes, PADDs, and bottles all over the place. Raye's normally organized desk is in utter chaos.

Raye slowly slides out of her bed. She walks over to her nightstand and takes a long look in the mirror. She's very disappointed in what she sees.

Raye's self confidence has gone right down the drain since that fateful day two months ago. She no longer wears makeup. She no longer bothers to make sure her long black hair is in perfect condition. She now just places it in a pony tail and ties it back with a rubber band.

Raye, frankly, just doesn't give a damn.

"Why should I?" Raye finally asks herself.

She mopes into the bathroom and showers. She mopes over to her closet and gets dressed for work. She mopes over to her desk and flings the crap that was on her chair to the floor. She picks up a PADD and looks it over.

Raye studies the PADD for several minutes. She finally growls at it and throws it across the room.

"That's not right at all."

Raye grumbles again and walks out of her quarters.

This walk has become a morning ritual for her and some of the other crew members that live on deck four, section eight, near her. They have learned what they need to do if they see Raye coming.

Hide.

One crew man starts to walk out of his quarters as Raye comes walking by.

"By honey! I love you!" He calls into his quarters as he starts to walk out. He suddenly notices Raye standing there. The crewman's eyes go white. He quickly turns and runs back into the quarters.

The doors slide shut and a locking chirp is heard.

Raye shakes her head and sighs. She walks up to the turbolift to find another man standing there waiting for the lift. The man looks at her, and smiles. He then returns his attention to waiting for the elevator.

Raye cocks her head and watches him for a moment.

_He must be new. He hasn't run in terror._

The crewman turns back to her. He smiles again.

"Yes, Commander, I am new." He smiles. Raye looks bug-eyed at him. "And even if I wasn't I doubt I would run in terror. Not really my style."

"I'm also Betazed." He offers his hand. Raye takes it and they shake. "Lt. Jeff Fuchs."

"What do you do here?" Raye asked.

"I'm the new assistant to the ships counselor."

Raye takes a step back. "Assistant?" Raye was unaware that they had hired her an assistant.

"Yup." Jeff nods. "I'm on my way up to her office now."

Raye grins. The turbolift opens. The pair walks in.

"Deck Eight." They both say in unison.

"You're going that way too, eh?" Jeff asked.

Raye nods.

They ride in silence for the quick ride down to deck eight. When the doors open they both walk out. They walk down the hall and stop at the door to Raye's office. Jeff walks up to the doors, but they do not open.

"Doors locked." The computer helpfully tells him.

"I guess she's not in yet!" Jeff laughs. Raye smiles, steps past him, enters in her code, and the doors open.

"She doesn't usually get in until 0730 on Mondays." Raye smiles.

Jeff laughs and the pair walks in.

Shampoo sighed.

The slow moving stars on the view screen were becoming very boring. She was getting very sick of watching the same star hardly move at all.

Shampoo hated impulse.

The warping stars had become her escape when she was on the bridge. Her escape from the memories; her escape from reality.

Shampoo had gotten back to normal for the most part over the past two months. She had finally come to terms with Mousse's death. And she was beginning to come to terms with Ranma's marriage to Akane.

The pair had not made it public, but after Shampoo saw them kissing after the memorial service she had made a point to keep checking their personal records. She knew she didn't have access to Ranma's record, but she could easily access Akane's.

Shampoo sighed again. She sat up in her seat and turned towards the helmsman. Ryouga was not in yet, so she wasn't worried about getting lost if she wanted to go for a little joyride.

"Helm!" Shampoo yelled. "Do loop-de-loop!"

The helmsman turned to Shampoo. Mina does as well.

"Loop-de-loop?" He asked.

"Yeah!" Shampoo stands and demonstrates what a loop-de-loop is with her hands.

"Yes ma'am." The helmsman acknowledged.

The ship starts to move forward very quickly. Shampoo sits back down and smiles as the stars start moving again. The ship then pitches the stern up 45 degrees. After a few seconds the ship is back the way it was, one loop-de-loop complete. Shampoo claps and giggles.

"Now do barrel roll." Shampoo ordered.

The helmsman looks over to Mina's station. Mina just shrugs and the helmsman complies. The ship completes several barrel rolls.

"Shampoo pleased!" Shampoo states, walking to the helmsman and patting him on the back. "Now, do both!"

The helmsman is starting to get into the spirit of things. He giggles and starts to move the ship forward, increasing the speed. The ship pitches upwards and begins the loop-de-loop.

Helm hits a few more buttons and the ship starts to roll. The starts begin spinning in every which direction.

Meanwhile, in ten-forward:

"What the hell?" Gosnell says, pointing towards the windows. Serena and Lita both turn and look out the window. They see the odd direction that the stars are spinning in.

"Uh-" Serena mumbles.

Meanwhile in Ranma and Akane's quarters:

Ranma smiles as he finishes getting dressed. He starts to pat his hair while looking in the mirror. You know, to get it to sit straight. Ranma stops though when he sees the reflection of the stars in the mirror.

Ranma slowly turns towards the window to confirm that he's not having a hallucination. Once that is established he calls for Akane.

"Hey Akane."

Akane walks back in with a sandwich in her mouth and a glass of water in her hand.

"MUMF?" She mumbles.

Ranma points to the window.

Akane looks. The sandwich falls out of her mouth. "What the hell?"

Ranma hits his communicator.

"Saotome to Bridge?"

On the bridge:

"Uh oh." Shampoo mumbles to her self. "Yes Ranma?"

"What's going on?" Ranma's voice asks.

"Nothing! All fine!" Shampoo turns to the helmsman. "ALL STOP!"

The helmsman complies and the ship slams to a stop.

"SON OF A BITCH!" A female voice, that's not Akane's, is heard screaming through the comm. system.

Shampoo quickly looks around, and then to Mina. "Shampoo on break. You have bridge."

Shampoo quickly runs to the turbolift and disappears.

Back in Ranma's quarters:

Akane can just stand there, her glass of water empty. She looks to Ranma-Chan who just fumes.

"Son of a bitch." She grumbles.


	3. Old Friends

CHAPTER TWO: OLD FRIENDS 

At the very tip of Sector Zulu 771 a starship warps by. The starship is a Sovereign class, the same kind of ship that was the USS Enterprise. Her sleekness slicing right through space. Moving at a comfortable warp 7 was the USS Crossroads.

On her bridge the first officer, Commander Ark Madcock was sitting in the captain's chair. He had some easy listening music playing out of the armrest console. He had his eyes closed, but was not asleep. His hand was slightly tapping the armrest to the beat of the music.

Commander Madcock was a chubby man who had a thin mustache. He was also one of the few people in the Federation who opted to wear glasses rather than get the surgery to correct his vision. He felt that the glasses gave him that distinguished look. Most people who knew him though just though he was a nerd.

The operations officer, Ensign Sai Vong seemed to be half asleep at his station. He was trying his best to listen to the music that was coming out of the command console.

Ensign Vong was an Asian man, pretty short but very muscular. He had short, spiky hair. He was leaning back against the rear wall of his station.

"Why don't I get a chair?" He asked anyone who would listen.

The tactical officer looked to him. "I don't get one either."

Commander Madcock never opened his eyes. "It's because you two need to be alert. If they give you a chair you might fall asleep. Especially on days like this."

Vong sighed and leaned back as much as he could without falling. He crossed his arms and started to hum along with the music.

That was until a beeping from the sensors console brought him completely upright.

"Commander?" Vong asked.

The commander opened one eye. "Yeah?"

"We have an M class planet on sensors."

The commander opened another eye. "Way out here?"

The ensign nodded. "Yes sir. Appears to be orbiting around Zima Prime."

"I see." The commander acknowledged. He hit his console and stopped the music. He then tapped his comm. badge.

"Madcock to Captain Mizuno." He called. "Please report to the bridge."

"Acknowledged." A voice called. It was the same voice that Trevor had for his computers voice.

After a few moments the door to the Captain's ready room opened and onto the bridge walked Ami Mizuno. The final Sailor Scout. The only one of the five not to be with the others.

Ami walked up and looked at the commander. "What's going on?"

"Ensign?" The commander ordered.

"Ma'am, I've detected an M class planet orbiting Zima Prime." Vong replied.

"Way out here?" Ami repeated her first officer.

The ensign just shrugged.

"Well then, I think we'd better check it out, don't you think?" Ami replied.

Madcock nodded and hopped out of his boss's seat.

"Helm. Divert course. 2-3-2 mark 0-0-9." Ark ordered.

"Aye!" The helmsman replied. The ship adjusted its heading and continued warping towards the planet.

Ami plopped down into her seat. She looked at her armrest console. She then turned to Ark.

"I see you changed my station again."

Ark hung his head. "They don't have that function on my chair." Ark points to the tactical display on the first officer's console.

"At least you get a chair." Vong whimpered.

"HEY!" Ark yelled. "Don't make me come back there."

"Sorry Commander." Vong replied.

Ark nodded at him acknowledging that it was all good.

Ami hit some buttons. "This will make the day go a little faster."

Some music started. Ami smiled at Ark. Ark smiled back.

"Shall we?" Ark asked.

Ami nodded. The bridge crew began to sing.

Helm: "I've been driving all night my hands wet on the wheel..."

Tactical: "There's a voice in my head that drives my heel..."

Vong: "It's my baby calling says I need you here!!!"

Ark:"And it's..." Ark looks at the clock. "...half past eight and I'm shiftin' gear!!!"

Ami: "When she gets lonely and the longing gets too much, she sends a cable coming in from above – don't need a phone at all!!!"

Everyone: "We've got a thing that's called Radar Love – We've got a wave in the air... Radar Love..."

Ami smiles. "Ah, classical music. What better way to fly to some forgotten planet in the middle of freakin' no where."

Ark nods.

Trevor sat and looked out the window that separated him from the outside world. Trevor was becoming very frustrated being locked away like he was. He decided that if he was going to be miserable he was going to make someone else just as miserable.

How to do that though. Trevor really wasn't in the best position to hit or kick anyone.

He didn't really think he could anyway. After all the drugs they pumped into him at the mental health facility.

Trevor realized how lucky he was that this civilization didn't do DNA testing and they looked just like humans. He can just imagine what they would do to him if they found out he was an alien.

"That's it!" He grins. "Earth music will annoy them! But which song do I sing?"

Trevor thought back. He was big on the musical history of Earth. He had tracks from the early 1500's all the way to the beeping music craze of 2333.

Trevor grins when he remembers one song in particular. The song that he was told that he ruined every time he tried to sing it.

"You wouldn't think that drunken people in a Mars karaoke bar would be so critical." He grumbled.

Trevor took a deep breath.

"She's in to superstitions, black cats and voo-doo dolls..." Trevor sang, very off key.

There is no response from anyone.

"UPSIDE, INSIDE OUT – SHE'S LIVIN' LA VIDA LOCA!" He bellowed, even louder and even more off key.

Still nothing.

"What the hell?" Trevor asked himself. He gets up and walks over to the bars. He does his best to look around.

"Hello?" He calls.

Nothing.

"Jesus Christ they all went home." Trevor grumbles and he returns to his seat.

A beeping noise starts to emanate from his pocket. He sticks his hand in there and pulls out his communicator.

"Good thing the fuzz didn't take this away from me!" Trevor grins. He opens up the unit. "Yes?"

"Trevor." The Ami-sounding computer voice says. "First, you shouldn't talk to yourself. That's how you got arrested in the first place. And second, I have the communications unit working and I am sending out a distress call."

Trevor grumbles at the nagging, but grins at the news of the working communication system. "Excellent. Beam me outta here."

The computer voice sighs. "I can't."

"WHAT?" Trevor screams.

"I JUST got the communications systems working. It's going to take me well over an hour to reroute enough EPS junctions to get the transporters working."

"Bloody hell! What am I supposed to do until then?"

"Well..." The computer replies. "Remember, you have the right to remain silent. I suggest doing that."

The communication is cut off. Trevor grumbles and throws his communicator in anger. He screams when he sees it hit the opposite wall and shatter into hundreds of pieces.

"Aw damn it!" Trevor whimpers. He walks over to where the shattered pieces are and fruitlessly attempts to reassemble it. He works on that for a few moments and then gives up, chucking the pieces into the jail cells toilet.

"Troubles?" A male voice asks.

Trevor turns to the other side of the cell where he sees a man sitting wearing a Starfleet uniform. The man appears to be translucent.

"HOLY SHIT! Where did you come from?" Trevor yelps, while trying to climb the wall in a feeble attempt to get away from the ghostly figure.

"I've always been here, Trevor." He smiles.

Trevor just stares at him for a moment. Then faints.

"-And what have I told you about emergency stops? You know that I am always near water when you do that!" Ranma-Chan yelled.

In Ranma's ready room, Ranma was standing behind her desk. Shampoo was sitting in the chair directly across from her. She was watching her feet.

"Shampoo sorry. Please don't be mad."

Ranma-Chan sighed and sat down. "I'm not mad at you. It's just; you can't be doing these stunts with the ship. It's dangerous. I know that you are bored. I'm bored! Shit these missions suck! But we still need to be careful."

Shampoo nodded. "Anything else?"

Ranma-Chan shook her head. "No."

Shampoo nodded once again and stood. She walked to the doors, but stopped just shy of where they would open.

Ranma-Chan looked up. Shampoo continued to look at the doors.

"When were you going to tell Shampoo that you and Akane got married?"

Ranma-Chan fell out of her seat. "What?"

Shampoo sniffled. "Shampoo hurt that you no tell."

Ranma-Chan stood up. "We're not."

Shampoo just shook her head. "Don't lie. I saw file."

"You can't access my file."

"No, but can access Akane's."

Ranma-Chan sighed and walked over to Shampoo. She placed her hand on Shampoo's shoulder but Shampoo adjusted herself slightly, causing Ranma to remove her hand.

"I didn't want to upset you anymore. After what happened to Mousse-"Ranma-Chan cut herself off. "I wanted to protect you from being any more hurt."

Shampoo laughed and continued walking. The doors slid open. "Shampoo no need you to protect me."

Shampoo walked off across the bridge and plopped down into the captain's chair. Ranma-Chan just sighed. She looked around the bridge. At her tactical station was Lita. She was keeping an eye on the tactical station, but was also watching the exchange between Ranma and Shampoo. Once she noticed that Ranma noticed this she started working on something else.

Ranma-Chan glanced over to the chair on the left side of the captain's chair. This is where Raye would sit. If she ever came back to the bridge, that is. Ranma had requested that she be assigned an assistant so at least they would sit there, but the seat remained empty.

Ranma-Chan chuckled when she looked over to Mina's station. She was sulking while staring directly at her station. She moved her glance over to Ryouga's station. Ryouga had his eyes affixed straight ahead and appeared to be very embarrassed.

Ranma-Chan had turned to walk back into her ready room when Lita called off to her.

"Captain?"

"Yes Commander?" Ranma-Chan replied.

"There's an incoming message for you."

"In here, please." Ranma-Chan asked.

Lita acknowledged and the computer on Ranma's desk started to chirp. Ranma-Chan walked over and had a seat. She punched a button and Genma in his admiral's uniform appeared.

"Hey pop."

"Hello boy." Genma cocked his head. "Why are you a girl?"

"Got splashed." Ranma-Chan explained.

"Why don't you change back?" Genma asked.

"Been busy. Working and all. What have you been doing?" Ranma asked smugly.

Genma started to scream. "YOU LITTLE INGRATE! AND HERE I GIVE YOU ALL THE BEST MISSIONS!"

"I've had 32 crew members killed in three months and you refer to that as the best missions?" Ranma dryly retorted.

Genma calmed down.

"Look, here is why I called you. We got an incoming message this morning." Genma hit a few buttons and Tatewaki Kuno appeared on the screen. He began to speak.

"I, the blue thunder of the Alpha Quadrant, Tatewaki Kuno, Age 17, here by warn you, the Federation. If you do not turn over Ranma Saotome to me for punishment in ten days I shall come to Earth and unleash the fury of my new weapon on you."

Suddenly Kodachi popped into the shot. "That retched pig-tailed girl and Akane Tendo must also be turned over for punishment!"

Kuno and his sister began to fight.

"The pig-tailed girl shall not be harmed!"

"Then neither will my darling Ranma!"

"Akane Tendo is mine to love!"

"She must die!"

Ranma groaned. "Pop?"

Genma reappeared.

"So what do you want?" Ranma-Chan asked.

"You are ordered to turn yourself over to him."

Ranma fell out of her chair.

"What are you nuts?" She screamed.

Genma cleared his throat. He then turned to the side. "I told you he wouldn't go for that."

Suddenly a bucket of water comes splashing on Genma and he becomes a panda. He is then promptly kicked out of the shot by Happosai.

"RANMA!" Happosai bellowed. "Turn yourself over, kill him, whatever! Just keep him from using that new weapon of his on my collection!" Happosai cleared his throat. "I mean Earth."

"Okay, okay." Ranma-Chan rolled her eyes and grumbled. "Do you know where the transmission came from?"

"OF COURSE NOT!" Happosai bellowed.

Genma-Panda leaned into the shot with a sign. "Somewhere in the Zima-Prime system."

"Okay." Ranma nodded. "We'll take care of it."

The transmission ended. Ranma stood and walked out onto the bridge. Shampoo stood and moved into her seat. Ranma looked to Lita.

"Everything in working order?" She asked.

"Yes ma'am – err – sir – err"

Ranma shook her head. "Thank you. Commander Aino, e.t.a. to the Zima Prime system at warp six?"

Mina typed in some calculations. "Four days."

"Good. Ensign Hibiki, set a course."

"Uh-huh." Ryouga mumbled.

Ranma looked to Shampoo and smiled. Shampoo just looked at the view screen. Ranma sighed and walked towards the turbo lift. The ship started to move but suddenly shook to a stop, sending people flying.

"Oops." Ryouga winced as Shampoo proceeded to kick the holy hell out of him.

Jeff continued to pick up the stacks of PADDs and other items that were sent flying in the sudden stop. He had just gotten the office cleaned up from the first time, and then it happened again. He was starting to wonder if this was a mechanical issue or just operator error.

Raye was sitting at her desk typing on her computer. She had been at it for the past hour. The only pauses in her typing were when she would stop to either get another cup of coffee or swear at what she was writing.

Jeff wanted to ask her what was wrong but he could sense that she was very agitated. He knew that he was going to have to help her sort things out, but he also knew that this was not the right time.

"God damn it!" Raye said, hitting the delete button on her computer.

"Commander?" Jeff asked. Raye turned to him. "Is that something that I could help you with? After all, I am your assistant."

Raye shook her head. "No, it's personal."

Jeff nodded in understanding. He went into the other room to clean up in there.

Raye sighed and tried to clear her mind so that she could think. She used to have no problem keeping her mind clear and focused, but not anymore.

It's been quite some time since Raye meditated. Most of the time she just didn't feel like it. Other times she just felt too sad to be able to.

Raye hated life right now.

She hadn't really spoken to Serena, Mina or Lita since Lita's wedding. She made the mistake of getting drunk. That was the last thing that she needed - a depressant.

Raye sighed and began typing again.

_To Admiral Genma Saotome, Starfleet Command. It is with a heavy heart that I tender my resignation..._

"Damn it. Why is this so hard to write?" Raye mumbled to herself.

Jeff walked back into the room.

"Maybe it's because you don't want to write it?" He pondered, as he threw some items into the trash disposal.

"Mind your business, Lt." Raye scowled. "And stop reading my mind."

"Begging your pardon, Commander, but you are my business." Jeff stated quite matter-of-factly. "I am YOUR assistant. Not just a janitor."

Raye sighed. "Look. It's a long story that I have NO interest in getting into." Raye thought back for a moment. "Not only that, I'm not ALLOWED to get into it."

"Okay then." Jeff said, walking off, knowing that she would be changing her mind eventually.

Raye turned back to the computer.

"By the way..." Jeff called. "Do you want to keep this? It was in the trash can but it looks important."

Jeff walked over and set Raye's nameplate on her desk. The name plate that Darien gave her. The nameplate with the rose on it.

Raye looked at it, looked at Jeff, and then looked at the floor. Raye began to cry. Jeff looked around uncomfortably. He took the nameplate and tossed it back to where it was. He sat in the chair directly across from Raye.

"I can help you." He stated.

Raye looked up, her eyes filled with tears.

"It started ten years ago..."

Ranma stepped out of the shower. He was all male again. He loved being the captain because he could get a water shower installed in his quarters. No sucker sonic showers for him.

Ranma walked out and put his uniform back on. He smiled when he saw Akane sitting on his bed.

"What a waste of time. You're just going to have to take it off again." Akane grinned.

Ranma grinned back at her and pounced.

Ranma rubbed his hands up and down his wife as they kissed passionately. Ranma started to unzip his uniform shirt, as did Akane when it happened.

Nifty Star Trek Doorbell Sound Here! 

"Son of a bitch!" Ranma growled.

Ranma walked to the door as he re-zipped his shirt.

"Who is it?" Ranma asked.

"Ryouga."

Ranma started to flail his arms at Akane who took the hint. Akane ran a few laps around the room, looking for a place to hide. Finally she just dropped and rolled underneath the bed.

Ranma regained his composure and opened the door.

"Howdy." Ranma said to his rival.

"Hi." Ryouga walked in and hopped onto Ranma's bed. The bed bounced down low enough to hit Akane slightly. She managed to hold in a yelp. Ranma grimaced at the thought of Akane being squished.

Ranma walked over to his desk and grabbed his chair and sat in it, facing Ryouga.

"What's going on, Ryouga." Ranma asked.

"Let me get this out of the way first." Ryouga said, standing.

"Okay..." Ranma said, not knowing what to expect.

"Permission to speak freely, Captain?" Ryouga requested.

Ranma nodded. "Yeah, sure."

Ryouga hopped back onto the bed, once again squashing Akane. Ranma once again grimaced at the thought of his wife being smashed.

"Well, I know you know about my getting lost on the ship..." Ryouga blushed. "...Naked."

Ranma nodded. If he spoke he'd start laughing.

"Well, that happened after I spent the night with Commander Aino. She thinks that she might be pregnant. But she refuses to go into sickbay to get tested.

"She thinks it would be embarrassing for people to know that she slept with a subordinate."

Ranma shook his head. "It's not. But I don't understand what that has to do with me."

Ryouga blushed again. "I was wondering if you could kind of order her to go in there for a medical exam or something."

Ranma thought about this for a moment. "Sure, I guess."

Ryouga smiled, but then blushed again. "Also, could you make sure that Akane isn't there at the time? I don't want her knowing what I did."

"Still interested in her, huh?" Ranma snickered.

Ryouga smiled. "That's right, Ranma. We had lunch together last week."

Ranma raised an eyebrow. "You had lunch together?" Ranma walks over to his bed and hops onto it next to Ryouga. A small squeak is heard. "Well good luck, buddy boy. And I will take care of Mina for you."

Ryouga nods thanks to Ranma and walks out of his quarters. Ranma stands and looks under the bed. He sees Akane smiling.

"Lunch?"

"You were busy!" Akane explains. "Besides, you had lunch with Shampoo the other day."

Ranma laughs. "It doesn't count when you are there, along with the rest of the senior staff! It's not my fault they are all girls!"

Akane crawls out from under the bed and stands next to Ranma. "Now, where were we." Akane starts to put her arms around Ranma.

Ranma sighs. "Speaking of Shampoo..."

Akane pulls her arms away quickly. "Way to kill the mood." Akane states, sitting on the bed.

"She knows."

Akane stares at Ranma. "HOW?"

"She saw it in your file."

Akane sighs. "She mad?"

"No." Ranma states. "She's upset though. Not really at the fact that we got married, but at the fact we didn't tell her."

"She would have gone ballistic." Akane exclaims.

Ranma shrugs. "Maybe we should tell everyone else."

Akane shakes her head. "Let's let Ryouga get over this thing he's involved in first. Who knows? Maybe he and Mina will get married and then I will be all yours with no one chasing me!"

Ranma shifts uncomfortably.

"What?"

Ranma chuckles nervously. "The Kunos are coming."

"Son of a bitch." Akane swears.


	4. Insanity

CHAPTER THREE: INSANITY 

"I SHALL SMITE THEE!" Tatewaki Kuno exclaimed in his state of sleep slash regeneration.

The hallway leading to Kuno's regeneration chamber was dark, with the only light being the green pulsing lights of the other regeneration chambers.

It had been three months but the Kuno's had finally managed to rebuild their cube, the first having been blown to bits by Ranma. The new cube was ready for the quantum torpedoes that had done them in the first time.

The Kuno's had looted a tritanium mine somewhere in the Beta Quadrent. Tritanium being the only material in the galaxy that could withstand the yield from a quantum torpedo.

The cube had to have several layers of the material if they were going to stand a chance against the Sisko's seven torpedo launchers.

The Kuno's were ready this time.

They also had a new weapon. They had bought it on the black market from the planet of North Korea. It appears that North Korea had secretly built isolytic weapons. They of course blamed the aggressive defense policy of the Federation.

"I SHALL DATE WITH YOU!" Kuno screamed, his arms flying out of the restraints that held him upright. He grabbed a hold of something and pulled it close.

"LET GO OF ME!" George Kuno, the Kuno's adopted brother screamed.

Kuno did not comply. George started screaming as Kuno began to lay sleep-kisses on him.

"ARGH!" He screamed ala Lucy in Charlie Brown after being kissed by Snoopy. George struggled best he could but still could not get out of the bear hug Tatewaki had him in.

At about this time Kodachi walked into the room. She noticed her brother embracing George. She scoffed.

"I see you two are getting along better." She stated.

George simply glared at her. "Help me!" He demanded.

Kodachi nods and walks over to the pair. She walks up to Kuno. She leans close to his head and starts to whisper in his ear.

"It's me, Akane." She whispered. "Squeeze me harder!"

Kuno complied and George began to change colors. Kodachi laughed.

"BITCH!" George screamed at her in agony.

Kodachi laughed some more. "Bitch, eh?" She leaned back into her brother. "I'm naked as well."

George's eyes went bug-eyed as one of Kuno's hands moved down George's back and grabbed his butt. He then started to scream again when he felt what he felt.

Something poking at him.

Yeah, that.

"KODACHI!" George screamed.

Kodachi just laughed as she fluttered out of the room, black rose pedals a flying.

George knew that he had to act fast. It was only a matter of time before Kuno, who even though he was dead asleep; grinning intently now, moved in for the proverbial kill. That was another memory that he had no interest in having. He already had enough that were stuck in him by his two lustful siblings.

"Ah ha!" George grinned as Kuno caressed him. George suddenly remembered that the Kunos were a collective. All of their minds were linked. All George had to do was make Kuno think of something that would cause him to release his grip.

George thought. What does Kuno hate more than anything?

George grinned again.

Inside Kuno's Mind:

Ranma walked up to where Kuno was making out with a naked Akane.

"Hello." Ranma said to Kuno.

"BE GONE!" Kuno yelled at Saotome, holding Akane even tighter against him.

Ranma grinned. "I didn't know you swung that way!"

"What speak you?" Kuno asked.

Ranma pointed at Akane.

Kuno looked. Now in the place of Akane was Rodney Dangerfield. He had Akane's hairstyle though.

"Hey! Why'd you stop?" Rodney/Akane asked.

"GOOD LORD!" Kuno screamed as he pushed the Akane want to be away.

In Reality:

The still sleeping Kuno pushed George away from him. George fell to the ground. He promptly grabbed Kuno's bokken, got into his best Sammy Sosa with a corked bat batting stance and –

WHAP!

The bokken connected with Kuno's face and smashed into a million pieces. Kuno snaps out of his regeneration cycle. He looks to George.

"Are you the one who has awoken the great Tatewaki Kuno, the blue thunder of the Alpha Quadrant, out of his slumber?"

George nodded. Kuno runs over and hugs his brother.

"THANK YOU!" Kuno bubbles. George whimpers. Kuno then releases his brother.

"I had the worst dream." Kuno sniffles. George pats his brother on the shoulder.

"It's okay. Let the thoughts drop out of your mind and think happy thoughts."

"Happy thoughts?" Kuno asks.

George nods. "Like the thought of us killing that retched Ranma Saotome, and avenging father's death."

Kuno grinned. "I like the whole idea of killing that retched Ranma Saotome, but as for our dear father, well he's not dead."

George just stared at him. "You told me he was dead!"

Kuno smiled and started to back away. "About that..." Kuno chuckles and runs away. George just sighs and starts to walk back to the control center of the ship.

_Oh kiekie! _George heard in his mind. He looks up, and around, and passes it off as just a silly prank that Kuno was playing on him.

_George!_ The voice said.

"Cut it out, Taki. I'm not in the mood." George grumbled.

Suddenly a holographic image of Principal Kuno appeared before him.

"JESUS!" George screamed, hopping backwards a good twenty feet.

"No, no." The holograph chuckled. "It's just me, your daddy!"

George eyed the holograph for a moment, and then resumed his work.

"Where did you go?" George asked it.

"You see, I had to hide out for a while. Till the heat died down and all."

"Uh huh. So what do you want?"

The holograph walked over to George.

"I heard that when you thought I was dead that you wanted to avenge my death! This clinched it that you were my favorite kiekie."

George looked back to the holo-daddy.

"You mean that there was some confusion before?"

"Well, you know that you are the best, but the others are my biological kids, so it was kind of a draw."

George smiled. "So, what do I win?"

"You win the secret to Silver Millennium torpedoes."

"What the hell are those?" He asked.

"They pack twice the yield that quantum torpedoes do!"

George grinned even more. "So it will be easy to defeat the Sisko?"

The holograph nodded.

"Well then." George stated. "Let's have it."

The holograph began to upload data into George's mind. George smiled with every gigabyte of destructive goodness.

Trevor slowly opened his eyes as he woke up. The view he had didn't reveal much more than the ceiling of his jail cell. Trevor didn't mind though. At least the ghost he saw wasn't above him.

"Trevor?" A voice said.

The ghostly figure looked over Trevor. Trevor closed his eyes and started to chant to himself.

"I am not insane. I am not insane."

"No, you're not." The figure replied.

Trevor sat up and looked at him.

"What are you?"

"My name is Foster." He said.

"You mean like the beer?" Trevor asked.

Foster nodded. "Yes. I knew that was your favorite beer so that is what I named myself."

"You just named yourself? And how did you know that was my favorite beer? You're not stereotyping me just because I am Australian are you?"

Foster shook his head. "No, Trevor. I know all about you. I have been with you for the past two years."

"What?" Trevor asked.

"I'll explain." Foster stated.

INTERACTIVE FLASHBACK:

Trevor, dressed in his Starfleet uniform, is hiding behind some rocks. There is phaser fire zipping over his head. Next to him are two other Starfleet officers. Trevor bears the rank of Lt. Junior Grade. The other two are ensigns. They peak their heads up just enough to fire off a couple of shots, but then duck down again.

"You see," Foster states. "This is Tenlix Three. A planet on the Cardassian/Federation border. This is my home.

"Unfortunately no one knew that when the Federation set up a supply depot there."

"Wait, Foster." Real-time Trevor states. "We scanned the planet and there were no life forms."

"Our people are energy beings. We would show up on your scanners as simple electrostatic pockets."

Some more phaser fire goes over their heads and several small explosions happen right behind them.

"You see, those energy pockets exploding from the Dominion weapons are actually my people being killed."

"I didn't kill any, did I?" Real Trevor asks.

"No, the Federation's phasers passed right through us. The Dominion's though. They were on just the right frequency to affect us."

"WE NEED TO RETREAT!" One of the ensigns's screamed.

"NO!" Trevor stated rather bluntly. "We are not leaving this position. We cannot let them advance any further."

Trevor stood and opened up on the advancing Dominion troops. After a while all the enemy troops were either killed or retreating.

REAL TIME:

"I still don't understand." Trevor said.

"Trevor, if you hadn't held your position the Dominion troops would have advanced on us and eventually killed us all."

Trevor sighed and looked at the floor. "We didn't know you were there. To be fair and honest we were protecting the food rations."

Foster laughed. "Yes, but on purpose or not you saved a civilization of thousands of beings just like me."

Trevor smiled. He had no idea he had such an effect on anyone in that blasted war. As far as he knew all he was good for was killing Gem Hadar.

"So." Foster continued. "I have been following you around for the past three years in order to repay you for what you did."

Trevor laughed. "You could have fixed my ship! Then we would be even."

Foster sighed. "Unfortunately I can't fix mechanical things. I can manipulate space and gravity and walk through walls but I can't fix a simple thing like your Runabout."

"Did you say walk through walls?" Trevor asked.

Foster nodded.

"Can you walk through that wall, find a key and get me out of here?"

Foster again nodded. "But that won't be enough to repay my debt to you."

Trevor shrugged. "It'll be a good start."

Foster nodded once more and walked out through the jail cell door. He wandered around the police station for a bit before he finally found a set of keys on a desk. He brought the keys back and showed them to Trevor.

"Which on do you think it is?" Foster asked.

Trevor picked the one which looked most like what a jail cell key should look like and tried it out. It worked and the cell opened up.

"Okay. Now, become invisible again." Trevor instructed Foster.

"But I want to see things like you do. I kind of like having this form."

Trevor groaned. "Well, at least make yourself whole. I can see right through you! And you will have to change your clothes."

Foster nodded, began to glow, and became fully visible. He then looked at a magazine that was lying on one of the police officers desk and made himself up so he was wearing the clothes that the man on the cover was wearing.

"Very stylish!" Trevor noted.

"Thank you!" Foster gleamed as the pair walked out of the vacant police station and into the darkening streets.

_Captain's Log: Stardate 60147.2. We're in route to the Zima Prime system to weed out the source of the Kuno transmission. Hopefully this will be quick and painless. It hasn't been long since our last dealings with them and they shouldn't have been able to recover very well yet._

_On a side note, I have the odd task of ordering my Chief Operations Officer to sick bay for a pregnancy test. I don't have any idea how I am going to do that without it seeming obvious, but since we are still three days out from the Zima Prime system I should have enough time to think of something by then._

Nifty Star Trek Doorbell here 

Ranma looked up from his ready room computer. "End log." The computer chirped. "Come in."

The doors slid open and Mina walked in. She came and sat down across from Ranma.

"Ryouga said you wanted to see me?" She asked.

Ranma silently cursed Ryouga's name. "Yeah, uh."

Ranma turned to his replicator. "Would you like something to drink?"

Mina shifted in her seat a bit. She didn't know that this was going to be something that would take so long that Ranma would offer her a drink.

"Just some water will be fine, thank you, Captain." Mina replied.

Ranma nodded. "One water and one tea; Earl Grey, hot." He instructed the computer. The replicator complied and the beverages appeared. He handed Mina her glass and took a sip out of his.

"So." Ranma said. "You know that we have been on this ship for almost four months now and we haven't really gotten to know each other?"

Mina nodded. "We didn't really get off to that great of a start."

Ranma laughed. He rubbed his head in the memory of Mina smashing a bottle over it. "All that trouble and I wasn't even a Changling!"

Mina giggled. Ranma leaned back.

"So, tell me about yourself. What do you like to do? What kind of sports do you like? Where do you want to go after here?" Ranma asked.

Mina also leaned back in the seat. "Well, I spend a lot of my time off duty with Commander Tskuino and Commander Kino." She just couldn't get herself to say 'Commander Gosnell'. "And I used to with Commander Hino, but she's kept to herself lately." Ranma nodded as he listened.

"I enjoy volleyball. I play on the holodeck when ever I can."

Ranma takes a sip of his tea. "Akane plays volleyball as well. You two should play together some time."

Mina nods. "As for after here, well I haven't really thought that far ahead. I was happy on the star base that I was assigned to before my transfer, but I am enjoying it out here. When we're not being shot at, that is."

Ranma nods in agreement to that.

"Well, here is the reason I wanted to see you." Ranma began his lie. "Apparently your physical was accidentally deleted and sickbay needs you to come and take another one."

Mina nodded, not believing a word of what Ranma just told her. "Okay."

The pair just sat in silence for a moment. Mina finally decided to break the silence.

"Did Ryouga ask you to have me take the physical?"

Ranma spit his tea all over his console and started flailing his arms wildly. Ranma was a terrible liar. "What? No."

Mina watched Ranma attempt to clean up the tea for a minute. Ranma saw her eyeing him and knew it was useless to continue with his charade. "Well, yes, but don't tell him I told you."

Mina sighed. "So you know what I did?"

Ranma nodded.

"So, do you think that I am a horrible officer for doing such a thing with a subordinate?"

Ranma sat up and looked right a Mina.

"No."

Mina took little comfort in that.

"Look, Commander." Ranma started. "Ryouga isn't a bad guy-"Mina cut him off.

"He took advantage of me when I was drunk!" Mina exclaimed.

Ranma just looked at her some more. "I don't think that was the case. You have more self control than that. This I do know. I have read your record.

"Now, I am going to be perfectly frank with you. This is just as much your fault as it is his. You two need to work it out before it affects your work anymore than it already has."

Mina nodded. She knew that he was right but she didn't want to admit that she could have been so sloppy.

"Do you think I am a bad officer because I am sleeping with Commander Tendo?" Ranma asked.

"No." Mina replied.

"Why not? She's a subordinate."

"You're married."

Ranma shrugged. "What if we weren't?"

Mina looked shyly at Ranma. "No."

Ranma looked at Mina for an explanation.

"You're a good officer and you wouldn't let it affect your decisions." Mina added.

Ranma smiled. "You are a good officer too, Mina. And so is Ryouga. He may be a moron, but he's a good officer and a good guy. Don't let something silly like this get in the way of something good that might happen."

Mina nodded and stood. Ranma stood as well.

"Please go get that checked." Ranma asked. "For not only yours and Ryouga's piece of mind, but mine as well."

Mina nodded, turned and walked out the door. After the door closed Ranma let out an exasperated sigh.

"God that was the most uncomfortable talk I had ever had to have." Ranma said.

"Did you have to tell her we were sleeping together?" Akane asked from the adjoining room.

"We're married. I think it's implied." Ranma stated as Akane walked up and sat on Ranma's couch.

Ranma stood and walked around his desk. He sat down next to Akane and gave her a kiss. Akane grinned.

"How'd she find out anyway?" Akane asked.

"Lita told her. She and Serena and Raye all know."

"I can't wait till we can tell everyone." Akane grinned as she kissed Ranma again.

Jeff sat up as Raye finished her story of events that had taken place over the last ten years. Jeff took in the words and processed the events in his head. The phone call letting Raye know that Darien had died. The shock of Raye's best friend shooting her. The bolt from the blue of seeing her dead husband on the Sisko's main viewer. The anguish of having to shoot dead her husband.

Jeff felt a tear come to his eye. He had dealt with many types of pain over the years, but never anything this intense.

Jeff realized that if he was going to help Raye through this he was going to have to pull himself together and say something.

Raye had just finished with her story. He face was red and puffy from crying though all of it. She simply stared off at the wall past Jeff.

"Commander." Jeff finally stated. Raye looked over to him, on the verge of tears once again.

"The pain I feel from you is unbelievable." He continued. "I cannot make it go away, but I can help you make it more bearable."

Raye stood. "MORE BEARABLE?" She screamed. "What the fuck do you mean 'more bearable'?"

"As someone once told me, pain is simply weakness leaving the body."

"Are you saying I am weak?" Raye growled.

"Well, yes." Jeff stated rather bluntly. Raye dropped back into her seat. "But it's nothing to be ashamed of. We are all weak in some ways. Myself, if I see a kitten I start to blubber like a baby."

Raye laughed. Jeff blushed and continued.

"But what makes us strong is how we handle our weaknesses."

Raye nodded. "I guess that I am not handling this very well at all."

Jeff shook his head. "How long did it take you to come to terms with Darien's original 'death'?"

Raye shook her head. "I didn't."

"This is why your pain his having such an effect on you now. I can tell that your mind is very strong and that you can over come this. It's going to take a while and daily meditation sessions."

Raye shook her head again. "I have tried meditating. All I can see is me pulling the trigger and the look on Darien's face."

Jeff nodded. "And then you wake up. See, your mind is trying to deal with it, but your heart isn't letting you. I have several different techniques that will help you ignore what your heart is saying."

"Ignore my heart?" Raye asked, thoroughly confused.

Jeff nodded. "Your heart and mind need to work together. But right now they aren't. Together we can get them back on the same page and get you back to the way you were before."

"I doubt that." Raye said.

Jeff stood up and gestured for Raye to follow him.

"Where are we going?" She asked.

"My quarters." Jeff explained. "The sooner we get started the sooner you will be back to one hundred percent operating capacity."

Raye laughed. She was beginning to like Jeff. No one had been able to make her laugh in quite a while. She liked it.

"Oh." Jeff started, stopping just shy of the door. "Go to your quarters first and change into something more comfortable."

Raye became rather defensive at this moment. "What?"

Jeff realized what she was thinking and quickly put her at ease. "Don't worry, Commander. I don't like girls." He smiled. Raye understood, having spent four years in San Francisco. "You need to be in a very comfortable state. Normally on Betazed we do these meditations naked, but I know that would make you far more uncomfortable then it would help you."

Raye nodded. "Is there anything you people don't do naked?" Raye asked, referring to the Betazoid wedding ritual of being married in the nude.

Jeff didn't miss a beat. "Cooking bacon and playing with scissors."

Raye laughed as she walked out the door, down the hall and into the turbo lift to go and change.

The Crossroads dropped out of warp at the edge of the Zima Prime system. She continued to cruise at one half impulse towards the third planet from the Zima Prime sun.

Ami was seated in her captain's chair. She started making a recording in her log.

_Captain's log: Stardate 60149.5. We have arrived at the Zima Prime system to check on a Class M planet picked up on long range sensors. As far as we had known there were no class M planets anywhere in the sector. Once we determine if they are warp capable or not we will then decide if we are going to make first contact._

Ami smiled. She hadn't yet gotten a chance to make first contact with a new civilization. She had specifically requested a long range assignment for that sole purpose.

Ami originally wanted to be a Starfleet doctor. Her goal was to be on a medical ship that would warp to a desolate planet and save the day. That was until she went to the academy to sign up.

_Starfleet doctors spend the first 10 years of their careers at Starfleet Medical here in San Francisco. _The recruiter told her.

Ami had no interest in that. If she had wanted to stay on Earth she would have just become a regular doctor in Tokyo and that would be that.

No, Ami needed to be out there in the vastness of space. She needed to be seeking out new life and new civilizations; boldly going where no one has gone before.

Yeah, it's a little corny, but that's what she wanted.

FLASHBACK! JULY 5, 2379 (9 YEARS AGO)

Ami grumbles at the overweight Starfleet recruiter.

"Ten years?"

The recruiter nods. "There are many other positions available though where you will get your first assignment on a starship."

Ami started too look though the pamphlet that the recruiter had handed her.

"There are tactical, operations, communications, engineering, and diplomatic specializations." He told her.

Ami frowned. "No science?"

The recruiter nodded. "Yes, but like medical, science officers start off either here or on a star base."

Ami groaned again. "What does diplomatic do? That doesn't sound very interesting at all."

"It is interesting." The recruiter informed her. "They are a very important part of Starfleet. They represent the Federation in conflict resolution, treaty negotiations, and first contact."

"First contact?" Ami asked.

"Yes. We have ships whose sole purpose is to roam around uncharted space and find warp capable planets and establish contact with them. To let them know about us; who we are, where we are from, and our goals."

Ami grinned. She thought that could be a lot of fun.

Ami turned to the man. "So, how long do you have to be in the academy for that?"

"There are three years of class room and then two years on a ship as an ensign. Once you complete that you are promoted past Lt. and right to Lt. Commander. Nice little loophole there. The Federation Charter forbids any Starfleet officer below the rank of Lt. Commander from diplomatic dealings. Once that happens you are then placed on a diplomatic ship and off you go.

"It's also a quick way to make Captain because we don't have enough officers specifically trained for diplomacy."

Ami smiled again. "Where do I sign?"

The chirping of Vong's computer brought Ami back to reality. She turned her head slightly to hear what he was about to say.

"Scans of the planet show no signs of warp capability." Vong stated very glumly. Ami sighed as did the rest of the bridge crew.

"Very well, do a through scan of the planet for the records and then let's get out of here." Ami groaned.

"Yes ma'am." Vong replied. "They do have spaceflight though and tracking satellites in orbit above the planet. I would recommend taking a position two million kilometers away and in the shadow of the first moon to avoid detection."

Ami nodded. "Helm, make it so."

The helmsman nodded and the ship took a position in the shadow of the moon closest to the planet.

"I am showing signs of a base on this moon, but no life forms." Vong noted. "But the base is on the other side so even if there is tracking devices there they should not be able to spot us."

"Good." Ami replied.

This is what life was like for the blue haired girl anymore. Finding new worlds with people on them, but not warp capable though. The prime directive forbids them from making contact with such worlds. Sometime though Ami would like to just beam down there. Just to see what would happen.

She knew it would be a mess though. She had two classes spanning four semesters on why there is a prime directive and what the consequences would be if the prime directive is breeched.

In the words of one of her professors, it'd be a 'fucking mess'.

That was the last thing she wanted to do. Have to clean up a mess.

The tactical panel began to chirp at almost the same time as the operations panel. Both Vong and the tactical officer consulted each other before Vong addressed the captain.

"Captain, we are receiving a distress call from the planet's surface."

Ami turned to Ark who turned to his display.

"Federation?" Ark asked.

Vong nodded his confirmation. "Yeah, I am receiving an audio transmission with it."

"On speaker." Ami ordered.

The shock of hearing the voice on the speaker caused Ami to almost fall out of her seat.

"To any ship receiving this message."

It was Ami.

But it wasn't Ami.

Ami looked at Ark.

"What are you doing on that planet?" Ark dryly joked. Ami simply smacked him in the head. The recording continued it's plea.

"This is the Federation starship the USS Sydney. We are a Runabout class scout ship. We suffered engine failure and were forced to crash land in a wooded area at 44 degrees, 17 minutes west latitude; 17 degrees, 5 minutes north longitude. If you can assist us, please signal."

The message began to repeat. Vong shut it off and looked to his boos for orders.

"Can the civilization detect the signal?" Ami asked.

Vong checked his display. "They might eventually track down the power surge coming from the transmission, but there will be no way that they can decode the transmission."

"And if we replied?" Ark asked.

"No, they won't be able to trace it." Vong answered.

"Open a channel then." Ami stated, standing.

"Audio only, ma'am." Vong informed her.

"That's fine." Ami sat back down.

A bleep is heard and Vong acknowledges that the channel is open.

"USS Sydney, this is the USS Crossroads." Ami stated.

"Ami!" The computer voice replied. "It's wonderful to finally meet you."

Ami shifted uncomfortably. She had never had a conversation with herself before and she wasn't sure that she liked it a lot.

"Yeah, about that." Ami said. "Why do you sound like me?"

"Well Trevor reprogrammed my audio subroutine to sound like you."

"TREVOR?" Ami screamed. The entire bridge crew looked her direction. She motioned to Vong to mute the transmission.

"Send it to my ready room." She ordered. Vong did as he was told and Ami scurried off into her office.

"Are we there yet?" Foster asked.

Trevor turned to his companion and simply glared at him. Foster took the hint and shut up. Not for long though.

"So, who is Ami?" Foster asked.

Trevor turned and glared at him again, but stopped and let out an exasperated sigh. He looked at the restaurant that they had stopped and front of. Trevor motioned for it.

"You hungry?" He asked.

Foster just shook his head. "No, but that's okay because I am never hungry. If you are though I will eat with you."

Trevor nodded and the pair walked into the restaurant. A waiter sat them at a table. Trevor starts to look over the menu.

"Shit I can't read this." He states grumbling at the alien language the menu is in. Trevor sighs and when the waitress walks up he simply points to a picture that looks good. He then orders a tea. Foster orders a tea as well and the waitress walks off.

"So?" Asks Foster.

"Ami is a girl I knew for a while. Till before the war when we had to go our different ways." Trevor said sipping the tea the waitress brought back for him. Foster tried to sip the tea but realized he didn't like it one bit.

"Why didn't you keep in contact?" Foster asked.

"She was sent on a deep space first contact assignment and I was sent off to fight in that bloody war." Trevor stated.

Trevor's food came. It was pasta like dish that had what appeared to be crab, shrimp and some other kind of seafood in it. Foster just looked at it in disgust, but Trevor smiled and took a bite.

"Oh my good damn." Trevor exclaimed. "This is delicious."

Foster looked at it. "May I?"

Trevor nodded as he dug in. Foster picked up a fork and took a small piece. He ate it.

"Not bad." Foster acknowledged. Trevor offered him another bite but he declines. Trevor shrugs and continues eating.

"Did you love her?" Foster asks.

"MUMF?" Trevor asks with his mouth full. Foster laughs at him. Trevor quickly swallows.

"Love?" Trevor asks again, this time understandable.

"Yeah. Did you love her?"

Trevor blushes and nods. "Yeah I did." Trevor sighs. "I still do."

"Well then." Foster grins. "That is how I will repay my debt to you. I will help you find Ami."

Trevor laughed. "Good luck! She could be anywhere in the galaxy!"

Foster nodded. "That's okay."

Trevor laughs again as he finishes eating, leaves what should be enough money on the table, and walks out with Foster right behind him.

"Why are you laughing?" Foster asks.

Trevor never stops walking, nor looks at his companion. "Well for one, you may be able to zip around the galaxy in mere moments, but I cannot. And for two, Ami is a beautiful, sexy, yummy little thing who has no doubtedly found herself a new man and forgotten all about stupid old me."

Foster sighed and continued to walk with Trevor in silence. Even if Trevor was going to give up on his one true love, Foster wasn't.


	5. Waiting

CHAPTER FOUR: WAITING 

Night, or what could best be described as night, had fallen on the USS Sisko as she warped towards her destination. The hallway lights throughout the ship were dimmed to fifty percent. The non essential sections of the ship were empty. Ten-Forward was closed for business, all but the required track lighting turned off. A few people had still come in to watch the stars before heading to bed, but they were dwindling fast.

Even though the Sisko was a battleship, and was ready for anything twenty four hours a day, the place seemed vacant. There were a couple of people manning the stations in torpedo control. There was one security officer working in the security office. Those seemed to be the only places on the ship where the lights were to full illumination. Even engineering turned down the lights at night to give one a sense of night and day.

Walking down the hallways there was no one. Occasionally a pair of security officers came down a corridor on their rounds, but other than that everyone was in bed.

Well, not everyone.

On the bridge the lights were also turned down to one half illumination, the majority of the light in the room coming off of the control panels.

The third watch helmsman leaned back in his seat. There really wasn't anything for him to do. The navigational system automatically corrected the course when necessary. He let out a yawn as he turned to look at the third watch operations officer. He also didn't have much to do. He occasionally looked at his panel to make sure everything was okay, but if anything bad happened, or was about to happen, alerts would sound.

The third watch tactical officer was the only one who seemed to be paying much attention to his control panel. They were at an elevated tactical alert status, so he had to be watching for any ships that may attempt to intercept the Sisko.

Both chairs to either side of the captain's seat were vacant. There was no need for a first officer or a command support officer on third watch.

All the other stations situated on various parts of the bridge were also vacant and deactivated.

There was also very little noise on the bridge. The only sounds that could be heard were the blowing of the life support system, the hum of the artificial gravity plating, an occasional chirp from the helm control, and the soft, gentle groan of the warp engines. There was no talking though. With only four officers, no one really felt the need to chat with each other. If they did they usually used the instant messaging capabilities programmed into each terminal. They could just as easily talk to each other out loud, but the dimness of the bridge silently asked them to be quiet.

In the captain's chair sat Mina. She was leaning back in it as much as she could to try and keep herself comfortable. She had her legs crossed, right over left.

Mina didn't usually work third watch. However that night, Lt. Girard, the third watch commander, wasn't feeling well and asked her to work.

That was fine with her. She was enjoying the peace and quiet.

That was until she started to think to herself.

She started thinking about what the captain had said to her. She was thinking about what she had done to Ryouga the day after. She was thinking about what would happen if she was pregnant. She had planned to go to sickbay earlier that day but didn't. She blamed it on being busy but looking at her six sentence activity report she knew that was a lie.

Mina's big blue eyes shifted direction. They moved up the view screen to the chronometer right above it.

60150.2 0217.13 it read.

She watched it a bit more.

60150.2 0217.14

60150.2 0217.15

60150.2 0217.16

_Don't let something silly like this get in the way of something good that might happen._ Mina readjusted her gaze to the stars.

_What the hell did he mean by that?_ She pondered. She couldn't imagine that Ranma was trying to hook her up with Ryouga. Why would he want to help out Ryouga like that? The two of them were always arguing. The only thing that kept it from actually becoming fisticuffs was the fact that Ranma is Ryouga's C.O. And even Ryouga had to have some respect for the rank.

Mina shifted her eyes upwards again.

60150.2 0218.55

60150.2 0218.56

60150.2 0218.57

Mina began to ponder the idea of a relationship between herself and Ryouga. Ranma was right about one thing. Ryouga seemed like a really nice guy. He had been comforting her in her self-pity state that she had been in right after Lita's wedding. He had complimented her and told her she was a total babe.

As inappropriate as it was to tell your boss that, she appreciated it. He seemed genuinely concerned about her feelings, and she could not see any devious scheme that he was hatching at the time.

_I guess I did want it as much as he did. _Mina thought. _But do I actually want a relationship with him?_

Mina glanced at the digital time piece once again.

60150.2 0220.02

60150.2 0220.03

60150.2 0220.04

Ryouga was a moron though, and that thought bounced around in Mina's head like one of those super high bouncing balls. He was constantly getting lost on the ship. He had gotten them lost while manually steering the ship though a nebula patch. He was unable to make simple turns, starts or stops without sending the crew of the ship to the deck.

Ryouga drank a lot as well. He would spend several hours after his shift sitting in ten-forward going though glass after glass of peach Schnapps.

_Of course I'd drink a lot too if I had his problems._ Mina thought to herself, of course referring to the little black piglet that he turns into upon contact with cold water.

Mina checked out her companion.

60150.2 0222.17

60150.2 0222.18

60150.2 0222.19

Mina had learned a lot about Ryouga over the past few days. She had sat down and talked to Lita, who talks to Gosnell, who talks to the Captain. Granted that would make what she learned hearsay hearsay, but it would have to work.

Mina knew that Ryouga had a crush on Commander Tendo. She didn't understand why Ranma and Akane didn't just end his little crush by announcing their marriage publicly, but she assumed they had their reasons.

Mina had also learned of Ryouga's curse. Both from her source and from seeing it first hand when the bridge's sprinkler system went off a few months ago. She found it interesting. She knew the curse would have to be a factor in any decision that she would make.

But there was an easy answer to the curse. They could just fly back to Earth and have Ryouga jump into the spring of drowned man. Why no one had thought of that yet was beyond her.

_Do I really want to be stuck in a relationship?_ Mina asked herself silently.

60150.2 0224.44

60150.2 0224.45

60150.2 0224.46

It was obvious that she didn't. If she had she wouldn't have used the word 'stuck' to refer to the situation. Mina knew that this job was a relationship killer.

She had kept in contact with Ami prior to the war. She had learned that Ami had met a great man. A man she had planned to marry and spend the rest of her life with.

Then the orders came in. The orders sending the two of them their separate ways. Neither of them really had the change to explore all the possibilities. Both of their futures had been determined by some no name admiral in a cold grey building who didn't even deliver the PADD himself.

_Could I handle that? If he and I fell in love and planned to get married? Could I handle receiving that PADD that sends us in different directions?_

60150.2 0226.30

60150.2 0226.31

60150.2 0226.32

"Does this night ever freakin' end?" Mina stated out loud.

The three other officers on the bridge all turned in unison and stared at Mina for a bit. Mina, realizing she had just broken some weird third watch silence rule, meekly adjusted in her seat so that she was looking in a different direction than the others.

Ami was thinking nearly in unison with Mina all those light years away.

Trevor.

That was a name that Ami never thought she would hear again in her life. She had thought that he had gotten killed in the Dominion Wars like so many others.

Then, here of all places, she gets a distress call from a computer sounding just like her. The computer tells her that her 'should have been' fiancée was on some pre warp planet. Stranded and in jail no less.

Trevor.

The name kept ringing in her ears. It was keeping her from getting to sleep. Ami kept readjusting herself in her bed but the moment she got comfortable she heard it again.

Clear as day it echoed in her head; in the perfect computer facsimile of her voice.

Trevor.

About Eight Hours Ago:

Ami slides into her seat behind the large oak and glass desk that sits in front of the window overlooking the starboard side of the USS Crossroads.

She pulls up her computer and hits some buttons. The Federation logo appears with some text below it flashing 'AUDIO ONLY'. She inhales deeply and starts to speak.

"Who are you?" Ami asked.

"I am the computer on the USS Sydney." Computer Ami replied.

"And who is Trevor?"

"Trevor Watts. You know him."

Ami sighed and took in another breath. "And explain to me again why you sound like me."

The computer copied Ami's sigh and began to reply. "After he was discharged from Starfleet he was given this Runabout. Trevor didn't have any friends left. All had been killed in battle.

"Trevor didn't want to go home. There was nothing for him there, he told me. So he decided that he was going to see if he could perchance find you out here somewhere. Problem was he didn't know which way you went.

"So he decided that he would just roam around and if fate decided that you two should be together then he would find you. About a year ago Trevor gave up. He decided that he would just find somewhere to build a house and grow old. He couldn't bear to be without you though, so he used some old communications that you had sent him and programmed me to sound like you.

"He also upgraded my AI circuits so that I wouldn't just be a computer, I could also be a friend."

Ami was speechless. She could do nothing but stare at her wall and take in what this computer had just informed her. She had missed Trevor as well. She had hoped that he would think about her and find her once he got out of the service.

"Hello?" The computer Ami asked. Real Ami came back to reality and looked at her terminal.

"Where is Trevor now?"

"Last I heard he was in jail. He had been arrested."

"What?" Ami screeched.

"Don't worry, Ami." The computer replied. "I've nearly gotten the transporters repaired. Once I do I will beam him out of jail and back to the Runabout."

"Nuts to that." Ami replied. "We'll be in orbit in just a few minutes. We'll beam you to the cargo bay-"Ami cut herself off when she realized she was talking to the Runabout's computer, and not to a real person.

"We'll beam the Runabout to the cargo bay and also bring Trevor aboard."

"Ami, you know that you can't come in orbit around this planet." The Sydney's computer explained. "This is a pre-warp culture, but they are very technologically advanced. They will detect a ship of your size and that would violate the prime directive."

"The prime directive has already been breeched. Trevor's made contact with these people." Ami stated.

"Yes, but they do not know that he is an alien. This race looks identical to humans. His universal translator is working fine and he told me that that did not give him a DNA test.

"The local authorities have passed off our crash as a meteorite and I am securely hidden in a cave."

Ami realized that she could not argue with her proverbial self any longer. "What do you want me to do then?"

"Just wait a while. The transporters should be fixed by nightfall. I will retrieve Trevor then and we will take off. We can then rendezvous with you."

Ami sighed. "Alright, fine. But if anything goes wrong, we're coming over there."

The computer chirped what is best explained as a computers way of saying okay. The transmission then ended and Ami is left to sit in her office and think about everything she just heard.

Back to the present:

The problem Ami was having is that the thinking she was doing didn't stop when she left her ready room. Ami stayed on the bridge until 0045, six hours after her duty shift ended.

She sat in her chair that whole time waiting.

Nothing happened though. She had them hail the Runabout again only to be told that things were going slower than originally planned and that they should continue waiting.

Ami wasn't sure what she was worried about though. She wasn't even sure if she was actually worried. She could easily hop over to the planet, scoop Trevor and the Runabout up, and be gone before the people there even realized something had happened.

But she felt compelled to wait.

Her diplomatic training and the lectures she was given about the prime directive kept coming back into her mind.

Yes, Ami's mind was busy that night. It seemed the only thing her mind didn't want to do was shut down and go to sleep.

"Computer, time?" Ami asked.

"The current time is zero two forty seven hours." The computer replied.

Ami sighed and slid upright in her bed. She got up and went to her closest. She picked out one of her grey uniform undershirts and a pair of black shorts. She walked into her bathroom and grabbed a towel.

Ami walked back out, threw on a pair of running shoes and left her quarters. She casually walked down the brightly lit hallways.

In a ship as big as the Crossroads there was always something going on. None of the lights on this ship were dimmed. There were numerous people walking up and down the hallways, each acknowledging their captain as they walked past her.

Ami walked on down to the turbo lift. After waiting a few moments the doors opened up and she stepped in.

"Deck eight." She ordered. The lift complied and took her down the six decks to deck eight. Ami walked down the hall to a corridor that was thinner than most of the others.

Along this corridor there were no doors. Just every couple hundred meters there was another corridor that came to connect with it. Ami stood and looked down the corridor as a man, drenched with sweat came running past her. Ami drops her towel at the junction she walked up at and begins to jog.

The Crossroads was one of the first ships to have a running track installed in it, rather than making crew members either use a treadmill or a holodeck. Ami preferred this to a treadmill or holodeck anyway. The distance all the way around the track was near three kilometers. It went all the way around the saucer section of the ship, and it was on the deck that had the largest circumference.

Ami knew that in order to get back to where she started that she would have to keep going. She liked having something to work for and after the third lap or so she started to really have to work for it.

Ami some how ran twelve laps that night. When she returned to her quarters her mind didn't have anything to think about. Not a thing except sleep.

"SNORT!" Ranma snorted as he rolled a bit in his bed. The loud sound woke Akane up from one of her deepest sleeps. She glared at Ranma but the drool dripping from his wide open mouth was just so cute that she didn't have the heart to wake him up and hit him.

"Computer, time." Akane whispered.

"Zero three thirty six." The computer replied, not whispering.

Akane pointlessly tried shushing the computer. Ranma stirred a bit, but mumbled something about egg rolls and rolled over the other way. Akane grinned and slid out of bed. She walks over to her dresser and throws on a set of loose 'laundry day' clothes. She slowly walks back up to the bed, kisses Ranma on the forehead, and walks out of their quarters.

Akane walked down the hallway, stopping a couple of times to look at the names on the door. She passed Raye's quarters. Then Serena's. Then Lita and Gosnell's. She finally came to the room she was looking for.

Nifty Star Trek Doorbell here! 

No response.

Akane sighed and continued down the hallway.

_She's usually up by now. She doesn't sleep all that much._ Akane thought to herself as she arrived at the turbo lift. Akane hit the call button and waited patiently. The lift arrived and she stepped inside.

"Deck eight." She ordered. The lift quickly took her down the four decks to deck eight. Once the doors opened she stepped out of the lift and began to walk towards the front of the ship. She nodded an acknowledgement to a pair of security officers on patrol.

Akane finally arrived at ten-forward. She walked in though the double doors and looked around. Behind the bar she saw a man doing what could best be described as opening duties. She smiled when he saw her.

"Good morning, Commander." He stated. Akane smiled back at him. "We won't be serving anything for about twenty more minutes." He added.

"That's okay." Akane said as she walked towards a table that was near the windows. There she saw who she was looking for.

"I dropped by your quarters. I wanted to talk to you." Akane said.

Shampoo just continued to look out the windows. Akane pulled out a chair.

"May I?" She asked.

Shampoo nodded. Akane sat down. The pair sat in silence for a few moments.

"What you need?" Shampoo finally asked, not bothering to look in Akane's direction.

"I just wanted to do the best I can in explaining why Ranma and I didn't tell you about us."

Shampoo didn't move. "I listening." She stated. Akane cleared her throat.

"We got married in a spur of the moment thing. We were going to wait until we got done with this mission, but it was just something about the events that happened that made us hurry up and do it. We haven't told anyone except Lita."

Shampoo turned to Akane. "That not a reason. That an excuse. You still should have told Shampoo."

Akane shifted uncomfortably. She was beginning to think that this wasn't the best idea she's had in the past few weeks.

"Well, Ranma didn't want you to be in any more pain. You were still getting over Mousse-"

Shampoo cut her off. "I NO GETTING OVER MOUSSE!" She yelled. Shampoo took a deep breath and continued, this time more calmly. "You do not get over someone you love dying. Would you get over Ranma death?"

Akane didn't even want to think about it. "I don't know." She said meekly.

Shampoo turned back towards the stars. "Shampoo would have been hurt, but would have understood."

"I'm sorry." Akane said.

Shampoo turned back to Akane. "I'm sorry. That going around a lot lately. Everyone tell Shampoo that they sorry. Shampoo tired of hearing it. If Akane really were sorry you wouldn't have kept your marriage from Shampoo..." Shampoo paused. "...And wouldn't have married Ranma to begin with!"

"Shampoo, I love Ranma."

"Shampoo loves Ranma too!" She grumbled.

Akane just sat there, really not knowing what to say. Shampoo stood, and turned towards the door. "Now, if Akane no mind, Shampoo have to get ready for work."

Shampoo walks out and into the hallway. Akane just remains seated.

"Damn." She mumbles.

Shampoo was in tears when she stepped off the turbo lift on deck four. She didn't really know if she was sad or mad or both. All she knew was that whatever the emotion was, it was making her cry.

Shampoo was sick of crying. She knew it was all her fault though. If she hadn't gotten so damned attached to Ranma. She had known from nearly day one that he had no interest in her. She just thought that she would be able to sway his opinion.

Then there was Mousse. She knew that if she had bothered to tell him how she felt that things would have been different. He may still have died, but at least she wouldn't have to bear the pain of knowing that he never knew how she felt.

Shampoo closed her eyes to try and clear out the tears as she rounded a corner on the way to her quarters. Suddenly she ran into something.

"I'm sorry!" Jeff stated, as he hit the ground. Shampoo also fell, the other way.

"Shampoo's fault." Shampoo whimpered.

Jeff quickly stood and started to help her up. She accepted his assistance. Shampoo blinked a couple of times and recognized him.

"You the new councilor?" Shampoo half asked.

Jeff nodded. "Lt. Jeff Fuchs."

Shampoo looked around, then grabbed Jeff by the arm and practically dragged him down the corridor and into her quarters.

"We need to talk." She stated.

Jeff nodded and sat down in a chair. Shampoo hopped onto her bed and sat facing him. Shampoo then proceeded to tell Jeff about everything.

After she finished Jeff thought for a few moments. He then cleared his throat.

"Sometimes good intentions appear to be bad." He stated.

"You saying what Ranma and Akane did was good intentions?"

Jeff nodded. "They both knew how you felt about Ranma. They knew that telling you that they got married would hurt you. They honestly didn't want to hurt you anymore after what happened."

Shampoo nodded, but didn't really take it too seriously, since that is what Ranma and Akane had been saying. It wasn't a valid explanation. Jeff sensed this and continued.

"I will be the first one to say that they should have told you right away. But they didn't. You need to work on forgiving them."

"Forgive them?" Shampoo asked.

"Forgiveness is the only way to free your own soul. It WILL make you feel better."

Shampoo sighed. "So what? Shampoo just accepts marriage and say I forgive you for deceiving Shampoo?"

Jeff shook his head. "You're under no obligation to accept the marriage. Though not accepting it isn't going to do you any good and may just cause more problems in the future. But you do need to get the two of them together, let them both know exactly how much that their deception hurt you, and let them know that you are ready to forgive them, as long as they promise to be honest with you from here on out."

Shampoo nods and smiles at Jeff. "You really good."

Jeff smiled back. "Thanks. As for the issue with Mousse..." Shampoo lost her smile. "You cannot be expected to 'get over' his death. If that ever happened you would be a terrible person. You do need to accept it. Take comfort in knowing that he loved you. Find strength in knowing that he died in honor, protecting the person he loved and doing his duty. And know that deep down he knew you loved him too. When someone loves you, you know it.

Shampoo nods once again and stands. Jeff also stands. Shampoo walks over to him and hugs him.

"You help Shampoo a lot today." Shampoo smiled.

Jeff smiled back. "We all have a purpose. Mine is to help people get through times like this. Being alone in our pain is the worst thing that can happen. Anytime you need to talk, let me know."

Shampoo nods and watches Jeff walk out of her quarters. Shampoo sighs and goes to her closet and gets ready for work.

At 0530 all of the lights on the bridge and the rest of the ship shifted to full illumination. It was as close to a sunrise as you are going to get on a starship.

Mina quickly fills in Shampoo on the whole lot of nothing that went on that night. She then jaunts down to her quarters, gets changed and goes straight to bed. Sleep eludes her for a few hours as her mind processes the decisions that she had made that night sitting on the bridge.

She had quietly logged in an appointment for 0415 the next morning to get a physical and pregnancy test in sickbay. She had figured out exactly why she had slept with Ryouga and determined the best course of action for what was to happen next.

Yup. Mina was ready now. All there was left to do was wait.


	6. Invasion

CHAPTER FIVE - INVASION 

Trevor pushed the bushes that were in his and Fosters way to the ground and stepped over them. He then attempted to hold them down so that Foster could also get over them, but they slipped out of his grip and shot backwards, knocking Foster flat on his ass.

"Are you okay?" Trevor asked a laughing Foster.

"Yeah." Foster replied as he stood and dusted himself off. "I think I hurt my bottom parts, but other than that, I'm gravy."

Trevor laughed. Foster eyed him confusedly.

"What's funny?" He asked.

Trevor chuckled some more.

"Nobody says 'bottom' anymore. Except for maybe three year olds."

Foster shrugged. "I'm seven hundred and three."

Trevor laughed once again. "Kid, you're alright!"

Foster smiled at the complement and the pair continued their trek through the woods to the stranded Runabout.

After about fifteen minutes of hiking the pair could hear some voices screaming at them.

"What did they say?" Foster asked Trevor who was increasing his walking speed.

"They said 'stop or I'll shoot'."

Foster halted in his position. "Shouldn't we stop then?"

Trevor never turned back to his partner. "No! We'll be arrested again!"

"Ah – good point." Foster acknowledged as he scurried off to catch up with Trevor.

The pair continued walking at an accelerated pace. They had just come over a small rise when a tree branch above them is shattered into twigs.

"HOLY SHIT!" Trevor screamed. "I thought stop or we'll shoot was just an expression!"

The pair began to run as they are blanketed with projectile fire – the rounds missing them by mere inches.

"The Runabout is just beyond these trees!" Trevor pointed.

Foster screamed and dropped to the ground. Trevor stopped and turned to his friend. "What happened?"

"I think I have been shot." Foster dryly replied as he staggered to his feet.

"Are you going to be okay?"

Foster laughed. "Projectile weapons don't hurt energy beings."

A shot lands about two inches from Trevor. "Well they sure as sugar hurt me, so we need to start running!"

Foster nodded and the pair began to run again. Within moments they were at the Runabout with a Zima security officer right on their tails.

"STOP!" He ordered.

Trevor opened the hatch and the pair jump into the ship. Trevor jumps into his seat and begins to power up the craft. The Zima guard opened fire and bullets began to zing off the hull of the craft.

"Won't those hurt the hull?" Foster asked.

"The ship is impacted by thousands of micro asteroids per minute while in space." Ami-computer explained. "Those bullets will do very minor damage if any."

Trevor grabbed a phaser rifle and headed back to the door. Foster grabbed him.

"What are you doing?" He asked.

"We can't let them see us take off. I need to do what needs to be done to protect the prime directive."

Foster nods as Trevor hops outside and stuns the only visible guard. He quickly hops back in and takes his seat at the controls.

The hatch closes and seals as the Runabout begins to lift into the air. Once a few meters in the air, Trevor swings the nose of the ship 180 degrees to face a clearing. The runabout slowly starts to move towards the clearing.

After passing over some small hills, the pair see what seems like an entire battalion of guards, most armed with small arms, but a few armed with shoulder mounted missile launchers.

"Now, those will do a bit more damage than the bullets." Ami-Computer states.

"Thank you very much, Captain obvious." Trevor groans. "Shields?"

"Two percent." She replies.

"Ugh." Trevor replies.

"I can stop them." Foster pipes up.

Trevor, without even thinking about it, pushes the ship to its maximum incline and thruster speed. "Do it."

Foster nods and disappears. As the ship climbs Trevor sees all he guards drop to the ground, appearing to be in pain.

Trevor stares at this for a moment till Foster reappears.

"What did you do?" Trevor asked.

"As you said, I did what needed to be done."

"What does that mean?"

Foster could sense some anger in Trevor's voice. "I killed them."

Trevor could only stare at Foster as the runabout climbed towards the cloud line; his staring only interrupted by the chirping of panels and Ami-Computer's voice piping in.

"Trevor, three plasma powered fighter air craft with highly explosive missiles are on an intercept course. They will be within weapons range in three minutes."

Trevor just groaned and turned back to his piloting. "We need to have a serious talk when we get out of this."

Foster sighed and took his seat in the back of the cabin.

The Sisko dropped out of warp at the very edge of sector Zulu 771. The smoothness of the stop implied that Ensign Ryouga Hibiki was off the clock.

Indeed he was.

Ryouga was hanging around in ten-forward. He noted the stars slowing from the streaking warp effect to simply standing seemingly still.

"Hey." Mina's voice called to him.

Ryouga turned and saw her standing behind him.

"Hi." He stated. Ryouga turned back to his drink and resumed looking out the window.

"Do you mind if I sit down?" Mina asked.

Ryouga laughed. "What's the difference? As you are so inclined to mention as much as you can you are my commanding officer."

Mina sighed as she sat down. A waiter walked up to the table. Mina just shooed him away.

"Ryouga," Mina started. "I just got back from sickbay."

Ryouga shifted his eyes from the star field to Mina.

"And?" He asked.

"Negative." Mina replied.

The sigh of relief from Ryouga could be heard back at Starfleet command in San Francisco.

Ryouga smiled. "Permission to speak freely?"

Mina nodded.

"I was going to do what you asked. I had never gotten drunk before, well not THAT drunk, and I know that you were very drunk too. I should have been able to control myself better." Ryouga stated.

Mina took a moment to take all that in before starting with her own speech.

"No, it's not your fault. I was also a willing participant in it. And I need to apologize for the way I reacted the next morning." Mina cleared her throat. "I hope that everything is okay."

Ryouga laughed. "It was a little swollen, but no worse for the wear."

"Still works?" Mina asked.

Ryouga blushed. "I think so."

Mina grinned. Ryouga was oblivious.

Then he got it.

"WHAT?" He screamed.

Everyone in ten-forward turned and looked at the pair. Mina smacked Ryouga on the top of the head.

"Come on." Mina ordered.

Ryouga blushed, grinned, and followed Mina out of the lounge.

Behind the bar Gosnell grinned. He hit is communicator.

"Gosnell to Gosnell."

Feedback spewed out of his communicator. He hit it again after several of the bars patrons gave him the evil eye.

"Stupid thing. Not me Gosnell! The other one!" He hit his comm. badge once again. "Gosnell to Commander Gosnell."

"WHAT!" Lita yelled. "Some of us are trying to sleep here!"

"Sorry sweetie, just thought that you would want to know that Mina's getting some."

"WHAT?!?!?!" She exclaimed. The signal went dead and within just a few seconds Lita materialized in front of the bar. Gosnell's jaw dropped when he saw his half naked wife appear. He quickly grabbed a spare Starfleet uniform jacket from behind the bar and made her put it on.

"What's this about Mina getting some?" Lita demanded the information.

"She left with Ryouga." Gosnell grinned.

Lita shook her head. "That doesn't mean anything."

Gosnell grinned. "He had the look."

"What look?"

Gosnell sighed. "Are we having sex tonight?"

"Probably." Lita replied quietly.

Gosnell got a big dopey grin on his face. Lita's eyes opened wide. Gosnell started to laugh.

"That look." He giggled.

Lita grinned. She then took a seat at the bar. "Give me a Mountain Dew." She said.

Gosnell shook his head negatively. "Not till you go put some pants on."

Lita suddenly realized that under the Starfleet jacket she was only wearing her underwear. Lita hit her comm. badge. "Execute site to site transport pattern Lita 7 G."

The computer chirped an acknowledgement and she vanished into nothingness.

"The Sisko has entered the sector." George stated to his siblings.

Tatewaki Kuno grinned. He walked over to the control panel. "Time to smite!" he grinned.

"Brother dear..." Kodachi grumbled. "You aren't thinking of hurting my darling Ranma."

"Oh for fucks sake." George grumbled as he entered in the intercept coordinates into the computer. Tatewaki drew his bokken and took up a fighting stance across the way from his sister.

"My goal is to rescue the fair Akane Tendo and my beloved pig-tailed girl. If Saotome is to be destroyed it will be just a nice coincidence." Kuno stated.

Kodachi glowered. "That wretched Akane Tendo will NOT be brought aboard this ship as long as I am here."

"I can fix that!" Kuno bellowed.

"ON GUARD, BROTHER DEAR!" Kodachi retorted.

"Shaddup both of you!" George yelled, besting them both with two phaser blasts. The two siblings fell to the ground, stunned but unharmed.

Tatewaki staggers to his feet and draws his bokken on George. "How dare you fire upon the blue-"Kuno is cut off as George raises the phaser to bear on him.

"You want some more?" George asks.

Tatewaki re-holsters his bokken. "The mission at hand is of utmost importance. I yield for now, but we will finish this later."

Kodachi also staggers to her feet. "I DO NOT YIELD!" She screams as she charges the two Kuno boys with her rhythmic gymnastic ribbon twirling. George fires one shot, knocking her back on her ass.

Tatewaki grins slightly. Kodachi returns to her feet.

"Yes, the mission at hand is what we need to concentrate on. We'll settle this later." Kodachi cackles and flutters out of the room, rose pedals flying in every which direction.

George merely shakes his head.

"Are these drones of yours going to work?" He asks Tatewaki.

"Do you doubt the workmanship of the house of Kuno?"

George eyes his brother for a moment, then speaks.

"No. Just curious."

Kuno nods. "Yes, they have been programmed to capture Akane Tendo and the pig tailed girl. They have also been programmed to kill Ranma Saotome."

George nods. "Good. Five minutes to intercept."

Kuno looks at the panel. "What about that ship?"

George shrugs. "The neuron-radiation jammer will keep the Sisko from contacting them. After we are done with Ranma we can blow them up later."

Kuno cackles. George just groans.

Shampoo was playing a computer game on Ranma's command panel when Ranma walked onto the bridge. Shampoo quickly turned it off and moved to her own seat. Ranma just chuckled.

"You don't have to stop on my account." He said.

Shampoo just shrugged. "Shampoo losing anyway."

Ranma nodded and took his seat. He looked at the view screen. The stars seemed to just be sitting there.

Ranma stared a bit closer.

_Those stars are doing something odd._ He thought.

The stars in the center of the view screen seemed to move position ever so slightly, and then back to where they were. Ranma had seen that before.

"Holy shit." He said.

Before he could say anything else the Kuno cube de-cloaked and stopped right in front of the Sisko.

Shampoo hopped out of her seat. Ranma stood as well.

"SHIELDS!" They cried in unison.

The humming of the shields kicked in.

"RED ALERT!" Ranma yelled. "ALL SENIOR OFFICERS TO THE BRIDGE!"

In Mina's quarters:

Mina was straddling Ryouga. They were both under the covers. Mina was passionately kissing Ryouga. He was more than grateful to return the kisses, albeit very sloppily. Ryouga didn't do this type of thing too often. He wasn't very good at it.

Mina moved her attention down from Ryouga's face to his neck. Ryouga stroked Mina's back, his hands moving up and down from the top of her back to the bottom of her buttocks, as she nibbled on his neck.

Mina started to move lower. She ran her tongue on Ryouga's muscular chest. She gave Ryouga's man nipples some attention as well.

Ryouga moaned in pleasure. Mina continued down. Her tongue making a trail that led down Ryouga's midsection, past his waist, lower and down to his-

"RED ALERT! ALL SENIOR OFFICERS TO THE BRIDGE!" Ranma's voice bellowed over the P.A., followed by the red alert klaxons.

Mina sat up.

"SON OF A BITCH!" They both screamed in unison.

In Serena's quarters:

Serena was up earlier than usual. She wasn't dressed yet though. She was still wearing her cute little cotton bra and panty set that she slept in. They were cute because they had little bunnies on them.

Serena sighed. She didn't want to go and sit in ten-forward until breakfast time. Gosnell was very strict. He wouldn't serve Lucky Charms till 0630. She didn't understand why not. She guessed it was just to make sure that no one else but she got any.

Serena walked over to her recliner and sat down. She looked at a book that was sitting on the coffee table next to the chair.

"Do I have time?" She pondered.

She nodded to herself that she did. She leaned back in her chair and got a bit more comfortable. She pushed a button that causes the foot rest to come out. She knew this would be easier with her feet up.

She closed her eyes and allowed her hand to wander up and down the side of her leg.

Her hand stopped near her hips. She sighed in pleasure. She pulls out a remote control from between the arm of the chair and the cushion. She pointed it at a video screen on the wall and hit a button.

Cat Girl Nuku Nuku appeared on the viewer. She grinned.

"Now that's the stuff!" She exclaimed.

"RED ALERT! ALL SENIOR OFFICERS TO THE BRIDGE!"

"DAMMIT!" She whimpered as she hopped out of her chair.

In ten-forward:

Lita walks back into the lounge. She sees the bar very busy and her husband taking breakfast orders. She looks around for Raye or Serena but sees neither of them.

Gosnell looks up and acknowledges her presence. Lita smiles and walks up to the bar. She takes a seat near the middle. Gosnell walks up to her.

"I'll get you your Dew in just a minute, babe." He states as he runs over to take some more orders.

Lita smiles. She's been looking forward to this since she got up this morning. Well, this and the eventual drilling she was going to give Mina about the drilling Ryouga gave her.

_Yeah, this is going to be a great day! _She thought.

Gosnell walked back up to her with a big glass of the green bubbly liquid that she has grown to love – no – need.

"Thanks babe!" She says, giving him a quick peck. Gosnell blushes and smiles, then resumes his duties.

Lita picks up the glass.

She brings it close to her lips.

"WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?" Someone yells.

Lita sets the glass down and turns towards the windows. Outside there is an enormous cube shaped ship towering over the relatively small Sisko.

"RED ALERT! ALL SENIOR OFFICERS TO THE BRIDGE!"

"Aw shit." Lita complains, hopping out of her seat and running off, her Mountain Dew untouched.

In Raye's quarters:

Jeff lights a candle. He places it in the center of the floor. He then sits on one side of it Indian style.

After a few moments Raye walks in. She looks different, Jeff notices.

Raye was brushing her long flowing hair. She is letting it go loose like she used to do. Her uniform is in perfect condition. All her pips accounted for and lined up straight. Her communicator perfectly aligned where it should be.

Raye sets the brush down on her nightstand. She walks over and takes a seat on the other side of the candle, across from Jeff. Jeff smiles at her.

"I like your hair much better that way." He notes.

Raye smiles. "Thanks! I do too."

"Why were you wearing it the other way then?"

Raye frowns. "Just didn't feel like going through the trouble."

Jeff nods. "Okay. Silence is necessary."

"Yeah, yeah." Raye mumbles. "Computer, deactivate all audio in the room."

The computer chirps.

"Okay. Breathe deep. One. Two. Three." Jeff instructed, as both he and Raye went into a deep meditative trance.

Suddenly the alert light in Raye's quarters started to flash, but no sound was heard.

In Sickbay:

Akane was walking around, checking to make sure that everything was in order. She had nurses and assistants to do all that but sometimes she was just so damned bored she had to do it.

Once she was done with her rounds she went into her office and sat down. She tapped some buttons on her computer, then shut it off.

"Activate E.M.H." She ordered.

The holographic doctor appeared. "Please state the nature of the medical emergency."

"Do you have to say that every time you appear?" Akane asked.

"Oh, I don't know. I guess it would be useful if you ever actually activated me in an emergency." It smugly replied.

Akane just glared at it. Akane had to be the only one who could put the fear of God in a holograph.

"I need to know how to deliver a baby." Akane said.

"Is someone pregnant?" The holograph asked. "The medical files don't say anything about that."

"Commander Mina Aino might be." Akane replied.

"Her last physical was this morning at 0522. She was also given a pregnancy test and it came up negative."

"What?" Akane asked, and punched up Mina's file confirming what the E.M.H. just informed her.

"As CMO you should pay a bit more attention to what is going on in Sickbay." The holograph stated.

"End program." Akane growled. The E.M.H. vanished.

Akane sighed and kicked her feet up and onto her desk. She pulled a pack of smokes and a lighter from out of her pocket. She also grabs her ashtray from out of her desk. She lights up and leans back.

Akane takes a deep drag on the cigarette.

"RED ALERT! ALL SENIOR OFFICERS TO THE BRIDGE!"

The sudden blaring of Ranma's voice over the P.A. startled her. She started to fall backwards. She flailed her arms in a pathetic attempt to regain her balance.

She failed.

Akane went crashing to the ground.

"Son of a bitch." She cursed while still lying on the deck.

The Sisko was sitting about 30,000 meters from the Kuno cube. The Sisko looked absolutely miniscule in comparison. This Kuno cube was over thirty times bigger than the first one they had come in contact with.

Side by side it looked like Verne Troyer (Mini-Me) standing next to Louie Anderson. It didn't seem like a fair fight at all.

If Ranma was worried though, you couldn't tell. He simply looked at the cube that completely filled the view screen.

Shampoo on the other hand was awe struck.

"It so big!" She commented.

Ranma nodded. "Tactical analyses."

Shampoo checked her display. "They have the usual Kuno weapons. Torpedoes, phasers, cutting beam. Nothing special."

Nothing special. That thought bounced around in Ranma's head. Could the Kuno's just have been bluffing to see if Ranma would actually turn himself over to them?

"They're hailing us." The tactical officer announced.

The turbo lift doors opened and Serena and Lita walked onto the bridge. The tactical officer acknowledged Lita and turned the station over to her. Serena took a spot next to Lita.

"On screen." Ranma ordered.

Lita complied and George Kuno appeared.

"Hi-diddly-hi!" George grinned.

Ranma snickered. "I'm Captain Ranma-"

George wouldn't let him finish. "I know who you are Captain. Please lower your shields and prepare to be boarded."

It's about this time that Ryouga and Mina entered the bridge. Mina scurried down to her station but Ryouga walked a bit slower. He also made a point to keep his hands in front of him.

In front of you know what.

Ranma laughed at George's arrogance.

"I'll do no such thing!"

George sighed. "Look, man. I don't have anything against you personally. The first time we tangled I wanted to blow you out of the sky just because father wanted to."

Ranma put his finger up to stop George.

George sighed. "Yes, I know I'm black. I'm adopted, okay?"

Ranma put his finger down. George continued.

"Here is the deal. I can't sleep because of you. That nut ball brother of mine has dreams of killing you and he constantly has to scream in them. Then he has dreams of deflowering your other half."

Ranma put his finger up again. Again George sighed.

"Yes, I know that you and the pig-tailed girl are one in the same. As I stated before, I'm adopted."

Ranma puts his finger down again.

"Then there is Kodachi! I'm not even going to tell you the horrible things she dreams about!"

Ranma nods. "I doubt I'd want to hear about them anyway."

George nods back. "At any rate, for this to come to an end you must lower your shields and allow us to board. You, along with Akane Tendo and Shampoo will be taken prisoner. The rest of your crew will go on to live long and happy lives, free to pursue both economical and spiritual enlightenment."

Shampoo stands. "WHY SHAMPOO?!"

George grins. "Cause I think your hot. I got myself some of that Amazon Jungle Fever. And shouldn't I think about myself every now and then?"

Shampoo just looks at Ranma. "He crazy!" She notes.

Ranma nods. "Sorry. You want to come over you are going to have to do it the hard way."

George nods. "Okay then. See you in a few."

The communication ends. Ranma sighs as Lita's terminal starts to chirp.

"They're powering up their forward torpedo bays." She informs Ranma.

"Fire at will." Ranma dryly replies, sitting in his seat.

Lita nods.

The Sisko unleashes a tremendous amount of both normal and quantum torpedoes, along with every forward phaser bank. The torpedoes impact the cube with an incredible explosion. Once the smoke had cleared everyone was surprised to see the cube not only in one piece, but seemingly unscathed.

"What?" Ranma asked no one.

Lita prepared to fire again when several silver streaks of light come flying out of the cube and impact the Sisko's shields.

The ship shakes violently. Panels explode. Pointless steam ducts spray people with steam.

"SHIELDS DOWN TO 60 PERCENT!" Lita yelled.

"RETURN FIRE! FULL SPREAD OF QUANTUM TORPEDOES!" Ranma yelled back.

Lita complied. Quantum torpedoes came from every torpedo bay on the Sisko. They impacted the cube, one after the other. Immediately following the impact multiple standard torpedoes fired and impacted the cube.

"They are taking damage." Lita responded.

Shampoo checked her display. "Target weapons, engines." Shampoo ordered.

Lita complied and fired again.

The cube also fired its weapon again. The torpedoes passed each other on the way to their respective targets.

The Sisko got slammed once again knocking people in every which direction.

The cube also took a tremendous amount of damage from the quantum torpedo regular torpedo volleys.

"Shields at 10 percent!" Lita said. "The cube's engines are offline, but her weapons-"Lita didn't need to finish. Six more of the silver torpedoes streaked towards the Sisko, slamming into her.

"SHIELDS DOWN! HULL BREACH DECK 3, SECTION 16. EMERGENCY FORCE FIELD IN PLACE!" Lita stated, as she returned fire.

The next volley of torpedoes from the Sisko all struck in the same place. Right where the silver torpedoes were coming from. A massive explosion came from that section blowing debris out into space.

There was an erie silence for a few moments while everyone regained their bearings. Lita was the first to speak.

"Their weapons are offline." She reported.

"Get our shields up." Ranma ordered.

"Working on it, sir." Serena replied from the engineering station on the aft section of the bridge.

"Too late." Lita said. "We've been boarded."

"How many?" Shampoo asked.

"50." Lita replied.

Ranma looked at Shampoo who returned the look. Ranma turned back to Lita. "Where at?"

Lita checked her display. "Deck three, section five."

Ranma's stomach dropped. "Sickbay."

Ranma stood and turned to Shampoo. "You have the bridge." He stated as he walked to the turbo lift. Shampoo turned to Mina.

"You have bridge." She stated walking over to Ranma. Lita eyed the pair.

"I have a security team en route."

Ranma shook his head. "Sickbay."

Lita understood. "I'm coming with you then."

Ranma nodded. Ryouga stood, once again shielding his groin from view.

"Ranma."

Ranma turned. "Don't worry. I need you here in case we need to get lost." Ranma laughed at his own joke.

Ryouga scowled for a bit before he got the play on words. Once he was sure Ranma was gone he laughed as well.

"What an ass." Ryouga giggled.

The trio exited the turbo lift on deck three. Yelling and phaser fire could be heard down the hallways. Lita walked up to a wall panel. She ran her hand along the back of the crease until she found a button. She hit it and a section of the wall opened up revealing four phaser rifles.

Lita tossed one to Ranma, one to Shampoo and kept the other two for herself.

The trio quietly made their way down the hall. They stopped when they saw what appeared to be Tatewaki Kuno lying dead on the floor.

Ranma checked it for a pulse.

Nothing.

"Captain." Lita called. Ranma ran over to where she was. There was another Tatewaki on the ground. This one also had no pulse.

They looked up the hall. The floor was strewn with Tatewakis. Ranma was befuddled. He didn't think that Kuno was narcissistic enough to make an entire army in his image.

"They robots!" Shampoo noted as she pointed to one of the Kunos busted open head. There was wires and chips sticking out of, as well as a blue ooze dripping from the wound.

The trio continued on. Every now and then they would find a security officer lying on the ground. Lita would stop and check for a pulse. They all had one. The Kunos were apparently just stunning the resistance.

The group advanced towards Sickbay.

"LET GO OF ME!" Akane's voice screamed from inside the sickbay doors.

Ranma opened the doors and saw a Kuno drone dragging Akane by her wrist. He noticed Ranma.

"I SHALL SMITE THE!" The drone yelled in a Kuno/Robot voice.

The drone let go of Akane and charged at Ranma. Ranma fired his phaser. The blast hit the drone sending his internal parts flying out of the back of him.

Several other drones walked over and started their attack on the trio. As Ranma and the other fought another drone grabbed Akane and flung her over his shoulder.

The drone carried Akane out the second set of sickbay doors. As soon as Ranma and the others finished off the drones they pursued the drone that had Akane.

"RANMA!" Akane yelled.

"I'M COMING, AKANE!" Ranma called back.

Suddenly another dozen drones materialized in front of them. A couple of them went to help the one drone with Akane, the others stayed to stall Ranma and group.

"Engineering to Saotome!" Serena's voice called.

Ranma ignored her but Lita answered. "What is it, Serena?"

"Uh-Lita?"

"Yes, what is it, Serena?"

"I have shields back in place. No more will be beaming over, and they can't beam back out unless they use a transporter room." Serena explained over the comm. system.

"Acknowledged." Lita slapped her badge and fired at one of the drones.

Ranma was more interested in avoiding the drones and catching up with Akane then he was with shooting them. The only ones he shot were ones that were directly in his path with no way around them.

"RANMA!" Akane screamed helplessly as the Kuno drones carried her off and down the Sisko's corridors.

Ranma ran after them, followed by Shampoo and Lita. Lita drew her phaser rifle to bear and fired once, striking one of the drones. The drone collapsed in a shower of sparks. The drone carrying Akane kept walking. Three of the other drones turned and faced the trio.

Lita fired again striking the next drone. He also went down in a heap, sparks flying from his torso.

Shampoo fired this time; however her phaser blast hit the drone and dissipated.

"They've adapted!" Lita yelled, starting to back away.

"We can't let them take Akane!" Ranma yelled back, continuing forward.

Lita nodded and ran up to one of the drones, and smashed her rifle over its head. The rifle broke into a thousand pieces, but the crude attack was effective. The drone fell over, a gooey blue ooze coming from its wounds. Lita looked at the ooze and gagged.

Another drone charged at Ranma. He quickly jumped over it and continued after the drone carrying Akane.

Shampoo smiled at the drone as she did some very impressive Amazon ninja like attacks, sending the drone into oblivion, blue ooze coming from gashes on its body.

"Nice." Lita commented, running after her captain.

Shampoo smiled and ran after Lita. "Shampoo got blue ooze on her boot!" She complained.

"RANMA!" Akane cried while pounding and kicking the drone.

Ranma jumped over and dodged the Kuno drones that had already been bested. He couldn't stop. He had to get to Akane before the drone reached the transporter room.

Lita and Shampoo finally caught up with Ranma. The three of them ran around a corner to find themselves face to face with about thirty of the Kuno look a likes. Ranma could do nothing as he watched the screaming Akane be carried off into transporter room six. He could do nothing as he heard the transporters energize.

Anger swelled in Ranma's face. Shampoo and Lita stared at him as he began to glow bright red.

"What the?" Lita pondered. She was soon grabbed by Shampoo who pulled her into a doorway.

Ranma started to laugh in his anger. The Kuno drones moved ever so close to him. They all in unison drew their bokkens.

"Fucking Kuno's." Ranma laughed.

The Kuno's raised their bokkens and prepared to land their blows on their sworn enemy.

Ranma crouched and placed his arms straight in front of him, his palms out facing his enemy. "Hiryu Shoten Ha!" Ranma screamed. The ki blast was unbelievable. The glowing sphere that blasted from Ranma's hands cut through all the Kunos, through the door to the transporter room, and through the wall behind that, creating a passageway into cargo bay five.

Ranma dropped to his knees exhausted. His breathing was somewhat shallow, but it wasn't due to the energy drain of his ki blast.

Ranma raised his arm up enough to discreetly wipe the moisture that was forming in his eyes. He stood and turned to where Shampoo was. Lita was still hiding in the doorway. Ranma regained his composure and started to speak to his first officer.

"I'm going over there." Ranma stated quite matter of factly.

"Not alone you not." Shampoo replied in the same tone.

"Shampoo –" Ranma started. Shampoo shook her head. Ranma stopped speaking.

"Shampoo know how it feel to lose someone you love. Shampoo no want Ranma to have to go through what Shampoo go through."

Shampoo thought for a second.

"Shampoo want to protect Ranma from the pain."

Ranma managed a weak grin. "Thank you."

Ranma remembered his feeble lie to her about wanting to protect her from the pain she would feel in known that he and Akane were married. Ranma knew, however, that Shampoo was not lying to him. She cared about him. She cared enough to let go. She cared enough to help him get back his true love.

It was about this time that Lita wandered out of her hiding place. She examined the left-overs of the Kuno drones. She then stared in awe at the remains of the wall behind them. She then noticed that she could see all the way into cargo bay five.

"Jesus Christ!" She exclaimed.

"Ready?" Ranma asked Shampoo.

"Huh?" Lita asked.

"We're going to the Kuno ship to get Akane back." Ranma said, starting to walk away.

"Hey, hey, hey!" Lita protested. Ranma stopped and turned back to her. "You two are not going over there without me."

"This isn't your fight." Ranma stated.

Lita pointed to the wall. "Look what they did to my ship!" Lita corrected herself. "I mean your ship."

Ranma raised an eyebrow. "I actually did that."

Lita nodded. "Yes, but you wouldn't have if it wasn't for them. Besides, if you get killed guess who gets their ass chewed out? Me, that's who." Lita starts to flail her arms in over dramatizing her point.

"I'm chief of security. Your security is my business. Guess what that means, Captain! I go where you go. Oh yes, I'm going, that's final."

Ranma laughed. "Fine."

Lita nodded at her victory. She wasn't going to let the Kuno's get away with coming in here, shooting her security personal and making her not be able to drink her Mountain Dew.

_I guess Gosnell was right! That stuff is addictive!_ She thought.

Lita shook off her thought. She realized she could not let them get away with this. No, they were going to pay and pay big.

"Aino to Saotome!" Mina's voice called over the comm.

"Yes Commander?" Ranma answered.

On the bridge:

"Captain, the Kuno ship is starting to move away. It appears that they have their engines working again." Mina replied from the captain's seat.

"Immobilize them. DO NOT destroy them, but stop them." Ranma ordered. "I, Commander Shampoo and Commander Gosnell are going over there."

Mina laughed. She would never be used to hearing the phrase 'Commander Gosnell'.

_Why did she have to marry someone with such a funny name?_ She thought.

"Did you get that, Commander?" Ranma asked.

Mina shook off her giggles. "Yes sir. I'll take care of it." She replied.

Mina stood and turned to helm.

"Ryouga, set course 1-0-2 mark 0-0-7, engage at full impulse on my mark."

"Aye." Ryouga mumbled, adjusting himself slightly to hide the woody he still had.

"Tactical. Prepare one full volley of photon torpedoes from all dorsal tubes. Target their engines. Fire on my mark."

"Aye!" The tactical officer stated.

Mina let the Kuno ship drift away a bit further before-

"HELM!" She yelled.

Ryouga complied and the ship shot forward towards the ship, catching up with it very quickly. It appeared that they might collide with the Kuno cube but the seven degree downward pitch of the Sisko was taking them lower then the cube.

"FIRE!" Mina screamed.

Torpedoes a plenty burst from the ships three dorsal launchers. They all impacted the Kuno's engine array located along the bottom of the cube. The Kuno ship drifted to a stop.

"Ryouga, bring us about. Tactical, if they try and move again, fire another volley of torpedoes at their engines. Be careful not to destroy them. We have officers over there."

The tactical officer acknowledged Mina's command. Ryouga hit some commands into his station and the ship very quickly, and very roughly, pulled a 180. Any crew member that was standing was sent to the deck.

Mina happened to be standing.

"Damn it Hibiki!" She snarled.

In the armory Ranma was passing out phaser rifles to his two female assistants. All three of them had taken off their uniform jackets. Now they were simply clad in the grey sleeveless shirts, black uniform pants and their boots. They had reapplied their communicators to their undershirts.

Lita did some work on a tricorder for a moment. She then connected it to her phaser rifle. It chirped a few times and she nodded. Lita went over to Ranma and Shampoo's rifles and did the same thing.

"The blast yield and frequency should modulate randomly enough so the Kunos won't be able to adapt as quickly." Lita explained.

"As quickly?" Shampoo worriedly asked.

Lita nodded. "Their technology is very advanced. It won't take very long for them to figure out the mathematics behind the frequency change.

"I did, however, program each rifle differently, so it should take longer for all three to become useless." Lita finished, slinging her rifle over she shoulder.

"Good job, Commander." Ranma nodded. "Now, let's go."

The two girls nodded and followed their commanding officer out of the armory. They walked down the hall and past the trashed corridor leading to transporter room one. Ranma's blast had demolished the control computer so they would have to walk down to transporter room two, just a section away.

Ranma thought to himself along the way. He thought that he was stupid for allowing Akane to be put in the position that she was in.

Ranma worried what kind of positions Kuno would try and put Akane into. Ranma shuddered at that thought.

He also shuddered at the thought of Kuno turning Akane into one of them. Into placing her into the Kuno collective. Ranma didn't know if he could remain married to her if she was going to be spouting off bad Shakespeare.

Ranma kicked himself slightly for thinking of such a silly thing at such a serious time. He knew that it was a possibility that he would never see Akane again if the Kunos were to escape.

He also knew that there was a possibility that they would be able to use their new weapon on Earth and that was also unacceptable.

The trio arrived at transporter room two. The transporter chief acknowledged them as they entered.

"Off to kick some ass?" He mused.

Ranma nodded. "What gave it away?"

"It's tradition in Starfleet that when you are off to kick some ass you do it in just the sleeveless undershirts." He replied as he punched in some commands into his console.

"Where do you think they took her?" Lita asked Ranma.

Ranma knew exactly where they took her. "Chief, put us a couple of decks below the main control center of the ship."

"Yes sir." He replied. "Ready."

"Energize." Ranma ordered as the three disappeared off the pad.

"I THOUGHT THEY DID NOT HAVE SPACE FLIGHT!" Trevor screamed as machine gun fire pelted his Runabout.

"I said they don't have warp drive." The computer replied.

Trevor groaned. Foster looked to Trevor.

"I can stop them." He stated.

"No, thank you." Trevor snarled. "You've done quite enough for me today."

Foster looked at his feet. "I was only trying to help."

"If you want to help, fix the warp drive!"

"I can't fix mechanical things." Foster replied quietly. "And if I use my power to give us a boost we could end up in another galaxy."

Trevor just groaned. "How much longer till we breach the outer atmosphere?"

The computer thought about this for a moment. "One minute."

"Can they follow us that far in those things?" Trevor said grabbing his console as the ship shook as the bullets began to penetrate the Runabout's shields.

"Yes, but the projectile weapons and missiles shouldn't be as effective."

"How far out is the Crossroads?"

The computer thought for a few more moments. "77 thousand kilometers."

Trevor groaned. He knew that if they followed him that far and saw the Crossroads he would have blown the prime directive all to hell. He knew that even though he would like to escape, he couldn't let that happen.

"Trevor, I can stop them without killing them." Foster said.

Trevor thought about this for a bit. The last time that Foster said that several people were killed. Granted they were trying to kill him, but they thought he was a threat.

"Trevor, they are still low enough they can eject from their ships and parachute down to the planet."

The computer agreed. "We're only at 8 kilometers."

"They should be wearing oxygen masks." Foster added.

"Okay, okay!" Trevor yelled. "But if you kill them I am going to be SUPER pissed."

Foster nodded and vanished. Moments later Trevor watched the wings on one, then the next, then the final aircraft fall off. The jets started to plummet and sure enough, the canopies blew off and the pilots ejected. They floated softly and quietly back down to the planet.

"There are eight more on an intercept course." The computer informed Trevor.

"Right." Trevor replied, checking his displays. "Will we beat them out of the atmosphere?"

"Yes." She answered.

"Okay, as soon as we are clear of the atmosphere set a course for the farthest moon, full impulse."

The computer chirped a reply.

"Will we be safe there?" Foster asked as he reappeared in the seat next to Trevor.

"Yes. The moon will shield us from their primitive radar. Plus we can out run them at impulse so we will be able to find a good crater to hide in before they even get there."

Foster smiled. He looked down at the display screen. He then turned back to Trevor.

"I thought you said there was only one Federation ship in this sector."

"Yeah." Trevor replied. "The Crossroads."

"That's Ami's ship." The computer helpfully added.

Trevor blushed.

"I see a second one. And then a third ship that's not Federation." Foster stated, pointing the blips out to Trevor.

Trevor read the display and snarled. "Why didn't you tell me there was another ship out there?"

"It wasn't there last time I checked." The computer replied.

"Dammit!" Trevor said. "I'm removing your AI chip when this is over with. You're developing an attitude."

The computer made a noise that can only be described as a computer blowing raspberries at him. Trevor just returned the sentiment as the ship left the planets atmosphere and shot off towards the moon at full impulse.

The battle had startled both Raye and Jeff out of a deep meditation. Raye honestly couldn't be happier. She was tired of these sessions. Sure, they were helping her deal with the memories, but to deal with them she had to remember them.

Jeff stood. He helped Raye to her feet.

"Lights." He called out.

The lights came on. Raye looked at him and nodded. "A jolt that strong can't be Hibiki. I better get to the bridge."

Jeff nodded and they walked to the doors. They refused to open.

"What the hell?" Raye asked. She pushed some buttons on the panel next to the door. They simply chirped in a non compliant sort of way.

"Computer, why won't the doors open?" Jeff asked.

"General quarters have been sounded." The computer replied.

"WHY?" Raye yelled.

"Intruder alert." The computer answered.

Raye slapped her comm. badge. "Hino to bridge."

"Go ahead Raye." Mina's voice replied.

"What's going on?"

"I'm a little to busy to explain it now." Mina stated. "But we've been boarded."

"Do you need me up there?" Raye asked.

"No." Mina dryly replied. "The safest place for you is to stay in your quarters. I'll call you back later. Aino out."

The comm. signal terminated. Raye sighed.

"I guess we're stuck here." Jeff mused. "What do you want to do?"

"I sure as hell don't want to do anymore meditating." Raye grumbled. Jeff nodded and walked over to her bed. He sat down on it. He patted the seat next to him. Raye raised an eyebrow.

"I don't think we should do that either." She stated.

Jeff laughed. "No, no."

Raye cautiously walked over and sat down on her bed next to him. Jeff smiled and scooted over to the other end of the bed. He stuck his hand in his pocket and pulled out a deck of playing cards.

"You play poker?" he asked.

Raye cocked her head slightly. "A little."

Jeff nodded. He turned towards the replicator. "Two beers, 8 degrees, M.G.D. circa 2003." The replicator complied and two beers appeared. Jeff hopped off the bed, walked over, grabbed the beers and returned to his sitting position on Raye's bed. He handed Raye one of the beers. "You want to deal?"

Raye took the cards from him. She looked at the backs of the cards. On the back was the Starfleet Medical logo. She then turned the cards over and on the front of each card was a different picture of a Starfleet psychiatrist. Raye laughed when she saw the card with Jeff's picture on it. He had a beatnik looking goatee.

"I was going through a phase." Jeff replied to Raye's unanswered question.

Raye laughed again as she shuffled the cards and started to deal.

"The game is seven card stud. Nothing wild."


	7. Retreival

_CHAPTER SIX – RETREIVAL_

"Set a course to assist the Sisko." Ami ordered. The ensign working the helm attempted to comply, but was cut off by the operations station chirping.

"Ma'am, there is a Runabout class ship leaving the atmosphere of the planet." Vong noted.

"BAH!" Ami screamed. "Set a course to grab it first then."

The helmsman nodded and began to put in the course information.

"Ma'am-"Vong started. The helmsman rolled his eyes and stopped his entry.

"Yes?" Ami asked, the annoyance very obvious in her voice.

"Sorry. But the Runabout is small enough to mostly avoid their planetary radar and observation stations, but we are not. We will be detected if we get any closer."

"BAH!" Ami grunted. "Is the Runabout in any danger?"

Vong checked. "Yes, but it's no Kuno cube."

Ami nodded. "Set a course for the Sisko then."

The helmsman hesitated slightly, but then once he was sure that no one was going to be changing their minds again, did what he was told. The Crossroads swoops around and starts to move towards the Sisko.

"Commander?" The tactical officer called to Mina who was going over damage reports with an engineer.

"Yes Lt.?"

"I am getting what appears to be a sensor blip of a Sovereign class starship about 30 million kilometers from here."

"Appears to be?" Mina pondered. "You can't be certain?"

The Lt. shook his head. "No ma'am. The Kuno's appear to be giving off some sort of radiation that is interfering with our sensors."

"Can you hail them?"

"I'll try."

The tactical officer hit some buttons. The monitor went to some very bad static, but a silhouette was slightly visible through it. The shape spoke some words, but they were very garbled.

"This is the best I can do." He stated. "But they do appear to be moving closer."

"Crap." Mina groaned. She stands and turns towards the engineering station. "Serena – you need to get the communications system working so that we can get through the interference. We need to make sure that they don't engage the Kuno cube while the others are over there."

Serena nods an acknowledgement and motions for the engineer that was with Mina to come with her.

Mina sits back down and sighs. "Keep trying to send a message through to tell them NOT to fire on the cube."

The Lt. nods and returns to his work.

Ranma could only stare in awe at what he saw. The inside of the Kuno cube was wallpapered with posters of his self, well, her self, and of Akane. He knew that the guy had an obsession, but this was sick. There was even a picture of her when she got sick on Tijuana 3, and, well spoiled the crystal beaches, if you know what I mean.

"Wow." Lita gasped. "This guy really digs you and Commander Tendo."

Ranma weakly nodded. Shampoo giggled.

"He in love!" Shampoo added.

Ranma just growled at Shampoo and walked to a doorway. He checks a tricorder.

"According to the scans we had done just before we left, this is Kuno's master bedroom that we are in." Ranma said.

"I didn't think that the Kuno's slept?" Lita asked, as she pawed though some of the stuffed girl-type Ranma figurines that Kuno had in multiple, unhealthy positions, on his dresser.

"Well," Ranma murmured. "I suppose that 'regeneration chamber' would be more of an accurate term."

Lita nodded and walked over to the door way where her bosses were.

"Now, through here is Kodachi's master _regeneration_ chamber is." Ranma nodded to Lita.

Lita nodded back and moved in front, her phase rifle drawn. Ranma crouched down and hit some buttons on his tricorder. The seal on the door released and it slid open slowly.

Through the door the room was very dark. Lita quickly put on some night vision glasses and slinked in. Once she was sure the room was clear she started to search for a light switch. She found one. She flipped on the lights and looked around.

"Holy shit!" She exclaimed.

The room was not only wallpapered with pictures of Ranma, but it was also carpeted. And that's not all. Kodachi also had Ranma curtains surrounding her regeneration pod. There was a Ranma clock on the wall, a Ranma calendar, and an Akane dart board.

Shampoo just laughed. Ranma scowled as he pulled the dart board down and broke it in half.

Lita snickered. "I hope you got some residuals for all this merchandise."

Ranma just groaned and walked to the next door. He checked his tricorder and nodded to the pair. They didn't notice him though. They were both busy digging through one of Kodachi's drawers.

Ranma cleared his throat to gain their attention, but only got a laugh. He cocks his head.

"What's funny?"

Shampoo turned to Ranma. "Can you shake?"

"Huh?" Ranma asked.

Shampoo shimmied a little. "Shake!"

Ranma shrugged and also shimmied. Lita fell to the floor laughing, Shampoo just grinned.

"This does it better!"

Shampoo tosses Ranma something. He looks at it.

"OH MY GOD!" Ranma screams and drops the device.

Shampoo starts to laugh. "It a Ranma vibrator!"

"I know what it is. Let's go NOW." Ranma bellowed.

Lita and Shampoo tried their best to regain their composure and walked over to the door. Ranma shook off the disgust. Not so much the disgust that his face was on a vibrator, but the disgust that he touched something that had been somewhere he NEVER wants to be.

"Now, through this door is George's chamber. After that we will be in the main corridor." Ranma explained.

Lita nodded and again took her place in the front. Ranma released the seal on the door. Like the last room this one was also dark. Lita quickly cleared the room and turned on the lights.

"WOW!" Lita exclaimed.

George's room had no posters. No wallpaper, no carpet. It was very drone-ish.

All George had was a cold metal grey desk with a small engraved piece of wood on it. Shampoo went over to inspect it. She read the engraving.

"Shampoo beautiful eyes." Shampoo said.

"Is he saying you have beautiful eyes, or is that where he wants to mount your beautiful eyes?" Lita asked.

"Shampoo have no desire to find out." Shampoo stated.

Ranma shushed them as he walked over to another door. "I have one bio-sign behind this door."

Lita and Shampoo scurried over to the door. Ranma disengaged the seal and Lita peaked in. It looked like a bathroom. The tub was full of water. Lita slowly moved in, with the other two behind her.

Lita looked around and didn't see anything. Ranma checked his tricorder.

"It's still in here." He whispered.

Suddenly the lights went out.

_WHOOSH!_

Something zips right past them.

"BEHIND US!"

_WHOOSH!_

"IN FRONT OF US!"

_WHOOSH!_

"WHERE IS IT?"

_WHOOSH!_

"BWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!"

The trio screams as they start to fall backwards.

"Has anyone seen Ensign Hibiki?" Mina asked the rest of the bridge crew.

Everyone shook their heads to report that no; they have not seen Ryouga lately. He seemed to disappear without anyone noticing.

Mina groaned. "Computer, where is Ensign Ryouga Hibiki?"

The computer replies. "Ensign Hibiki is not on board."

"Where is he?"

"Ensign Hibiki transported off the ship via transporter room seven at 0722 hours."

"And where did he go?"

"Transporter records are unavailable during a network virus scan. Please ask again later. Twelve billion files scanned, sixty seven trillion, nine hundred eight billion-"

"Shut up." Mina interrupted. She then groaned to herself. "Why the hell is their a virus scan running NOW anyway?"

Mina sighed and walked back to the communications station. "Any luck contacting the other ship yet?"

The operator shook his head. "No, but he signal is improving. We should be able to contact them in six minutes."

"What's the time till the ship is in weapons range of the cube?" Mina asked.

"Four minutes."

"Not good enough." Mina complained. She then tapped her communicator.

"Aino to Tskunio. Serena, we need communications up in three minutes!"

Serena nods, not even realizing that Mina cannot see her nodding. She then taps her badge and goes to help the engineers working on the communications equipment.

"What if we launched a relay probe?" One of the engineers stated.

"Can we get one ready in time?" Another asked.

"We should have one ready now, for when we pass through subspace variances." A third added.

"I'll get it launched!" A forth said.

"I'll call the bridge!" A final one noted

All five engineers scurried off in opposite directions. Serena just stood there and smiled.

"Yeah, I'm good." She grinned to herself as she walks to the turbo lift.

Back on the bridge the communications officer speaks up to Mina.

"Ma'am, we are launching a communications beacon. It should be ale to relay our transmission through the interference and get it to the other ship."

"Excellent!" Mina yelped. "Make it so!"

The communications officer nodded and made it so. Seconds later the bridge of the Crossroads appears on the viewer, clear as day, with Ark in the captain's chair.

"This is Commander Ark Madcock of the Federation starship, the U.S.S. Crossroads."

"Good day!" Mina grinned. "I'm Lt. Commander Mina Aino, of the U.S.S. Sisko. I appreciate the assistance you are planning on giving us, but I would request that you do not fire on the Kuno cube."

The weapons officer can be heard letting out a disappointed moan in the background. Ark tilted his head. "How come?"

"We had an officer kidnapped and we currently have a boarding party over there attempting to recover her."

"Right." Madcock noted. "I'll inform Captain Mizuno. Do you need more security personal?"

Mina ignored his question. "Captain Mizuno? Ami Mizuno?"

Ark becomes confused. "Uh, yeah."

"May I speak to her?"

"I don't see why not, hang tight."

Ark mutes the channel and starts to talk into his communicator. Mina couldn't hear anything but she was adept enough at reading lips to know he said something about a 'crazy girl'. Soon the channel re-volumeized.

"Going to patch you into her ready room." Ark stated as he transferred the communication.

Mina grinned when the face of Ami appeared on the viewer.

"Hey!" Mina smiled.

"Mina!" Ami smiled back. "Glad to see you are well!"

Mina nodded. "Same to you! Congratulations on the promotion!"

Ami nodded. "Thank you! Once we get everything taken care of we will have to get together."

Mina nodded again. "Yes, Serena, Lita and Raye will be very happy to see you."

"They are all on board over there?"

Mina nodded. "Except Lita, she's on the boarding party that is on the cube."

Ami checked a terminal just off screen and nodded. "Like I said, we'll get together when things settle down. Now, if you guys are okay, we have a problem near the planet we need to deal with. Yell if you need anything."

Mina nods and waves as communications are terminated. Shortly there after, Serena walks onto the bridge.

"Did you get in contact with them?" She asked.

Mina nods. "Good job."

Serena blushes. "Thanks."

"Guess who the captain of that ship is."

Serena thinks for a minute. "Ami?"

"No, it's-" Mina spins around. "Yeah, it is Ami. How did you know?"

Serena shrugs. "Lucky guess?"

Mina sighs. "She's going to come over after everything calms down."

"YAY!" Serena jumps up and cheers. "I'll go tell Raye!"

"SERENA!" Mina yells.

"Yeah?" Serena says, cowering slightly.

"Raye doesn't need to know right now. If she wants to be involved on what's going on she will come out of her little crawlspace and get involved."

Serena sighs and nods. She then goes back into the turbo lift.

"They've boarded." George told his siblings.

George got no answer.

He turns to see Kodachi standing above her brother with a very large katana pointed right at Kuno's gullet.

"FOR RANMA!" Kodachi screams.

George groans. He fires his phaser and knocks Kodachi right off her brother, the sword dropping inches from Kuno's neck.

Kuno sits up and looks at George.

"Thank you, but I had her right where I wanted her."

George simply rolls his eyes and fires on Kuno. "Now, you are both where I want you."

George chuckles at his own witty remark and goes back to checking out the sensor. "Four of them. Do they really think they will get you back with only four of them?"

"You guys are pathetic! Of course they will!" Akane cried from the corner she was tied up in.

"Eh, we'll see." George grumbled.

Kodachi starts to stir. She staggers to her feet and stumbles over to where George is seated.

"That hurts, you know."

George nods. "Yeah, I know. You two need to declare a truce until we get this mission done with."

Kuno also starts to stagger to his feet. "A truce? With her?"

"If the two of you can't get along for at least one day, then I will have to keep shooting you. And then I will have no use for Ranma or Akane and I will have to shove them out an airlock into open space." George explains.

"YOU WOULDN'T!" Both Kuno and Kodachi bellow.

"I would." George assures them.

Kuno sighs and looks at his sister. "I suppose for the sake of Akane Tendo and the pig-tailed girl I can work with you on this." Kuno dryly states, extending his hand.

Kodachi sighs back. "I suppose for the sake of my darling Ranma I can also work with you."

Kodachi takes her brothers hand and shakes it.

"Now, isn't that much better? Everyone getting along, huh?" George smiles.

Kodachi and Kuno both turn to their brother and give their best fake smiles.

Akane just rolls her eyes.

"Yeah, this is going to work." Akane groaned.

"Quiet you." George ordered as he turned back to his terminal. He giggles a bit when he sees the blips on the display. George grins some more, but then starts to frown. "What the hell are they doing in my bathroom? Why the blue hell is there phaser fire?" George frowns. "I did flush, didn't I?"

"JESUS CHRIST RYOUGA!" A sopping wet Ranma-Chan screams as she climbs out of the bathtub. "You scared the hell out of us!"

"Bwee?" Ryouga oinks.

"What the hell are you doing here anyway?" Ranma asks.

"Bwee!" Ryouga replies.

Ranma groans. "How's the water coming?"

Lita, who is also wet and on the other side of the room shooting a bucket of water with her phaser, replies. "Getting there."

"Meow?" Shampoo meows from the other room.

"STAY OUT THERE!" Ranma orders as she shudders.

Lita grins as she begins to see some steam start to waft off of the water in the bucket. She sticks her finger into it and nods.

"This should be warm enough, sir." Lita states. She then pauses. "Or is it ma'am?"

"Just give me the water." Ranma glowers.

Lita complies and hands Ranma the bucket. She quickly splashes herself and Ryouga. Ryouga, who is now naked, immediately scurries off to find his uniform.

Ranma hands the bucket and what's left of the water to Lita who takes it into the other room and pours it on Shampoo.

Lita walks back in and chucks the bucket into the corner.

"Well, that was a little weird." Lita acknowledges.

"I thought you knew about the curses?" Ranma asked.

"I did, but till you see it actually happen, you really don't believe it."

Ranma nods understandingly. He then returns his attention back to Ryouga who is just finishing putting on his uniform.

"Now, what the hell are you doing here?"

"What?" Ryouga innocently whines. "I want to help rescue Akane."

"How do you end up as P-Chan?" Shampoo asks, walking back into the room.

Ryouga, doing his best to not to notice Lita or Shampoo's very wet shirts, stammers.

"I am not very good at working the transporters. I ended up materializing right in this bath tub here. As soon as I fully materialized, poof; P-Chan."

The group murmured what seemed like an understanding murmur.

"Here." Lita said, walking over to Ryouga. "Give me your phaser rifle. I'll program it to be more effective on the drones."

Ryouga hands it to Lita. She begins to start to hit some things into her tricorder, but it simply chirps. The kind of chirp that you hear right before something goes wrong.

"This isn't a real phaser rifle!" Lita gasped.

"I don't have security clearance to get a real one out of the armory, so I just took the display model from the conference room." Ryouga shamefully acknowledged.

Ranma just rolls his eyes. "What did you expect to fight with?"

"Well," Ryouga begins. "I just figured that when they saw I had a rifle they would surrender and let me take Akane back."

Lita and Shampoo just look at each other while Ranma stooge-slaps Ryouga across the top of his head.

"You mutton-chop!" Ranma scowled. "Lita, give him your hand phaser."

Lita nods and tosses the phaser to Ryouga. He smiles and chuckles nervously.

"Alright, let's get going." Ranma ordered.

Lita nods and walks out of the bathroom, making sure that the main room was still clear. She motions for the rest of them and walks up to the door to the corridor.

"We need to hang a left out of this doorway, and then travel pretty close to a kilometer down to the access ladder to the main control center." Ranma states while checking his tricorder.

Lita nods and slides the door open. She peaks outside, slowly, and sees nothing. She creeps out and into the hallway.

"You can see all the way down the corridor." Lita states. "And I don't see a soul."

Ranma nods and guides the others out into the hallway. Lita up front, with her rifle drawn. Ranma behind her, Shampoo behind him. Ryouga comes out last, covering their flank.

They get about a hundred meters down the corridor when all the lights go off. The group quickly put on their night vision goggles.

"See anything?" Shampoo asked.

"Nothing." Lita acknowledged.

"Ryouga?"

"Nothing." Ryouga stated.

"Ryouga, do you have night vision goggles?" Ranma asked cynically.

"No." Ryouga replied.

Ranma groans. "Shampoo."

Shampoo grabs Ryouga and shoves him behind Ranma and takes up Ryouga's spot on the flank. "Nothing."

Ranma nods. "Keep moving. Slowly."

A K-Mart style intercom tone is heard.

"Welcome aboard!" George's voice states.

"Keep moving." Ranma whispered. He then raises his voice to speak with George. "Where's Akane?"

"She's right here in the corner." George stated. "But it's going to take you far to long to get here that way."

Ranma and Shampoo suddenly dematerialize from the group, their rifles being left behind, and dropping to the deck with a clang.

"Captain!" Lita calls out.

"I'm sorry!" George says. "I must have made you two lonely. Here. Have some playmates!" George laughs manically until the transmission is cut off.

"Playmates?" Ryouga asks.

Suddenly the lights turn back on and Ryouga and Lita are surrounded by the Kuno drones.

"Ah shit." Lita grumbles.

"I SHALL SMITE THEE!" The drones all state in unison.

"Yeah, we're boned." Ryouga sighs.

"Where are the ships?" Trevor asks as he lands the runabout in a crater on the dark side of Zima's farthest moon.

"They are in a high orbit around the planet." Ami-Computer replies.

"And they cannot see us?"

"Nope."

"Good. And what about the Crossroads?"

Short pause. "They are 45 million kilometers away and are holding position. They apparently attempted to make contact with the other Federation ship. They then turned away and moved just outside of the radar range of the orbiting Zima ships."

"Can we hail them?" Trevor asked.

"Not without alerting the security ships to our position." Ami-Computer replied. After a few seconds she continues. "I scanned them as they were firing on us. They can only maintain spaceflight for a little over nine more hours. It will take them months to search the area just around the close moons. It's very doubtful that if they don't locate us within the next few hours they will discontinue the search."

"Yeah, so what, just wait it out?" Trevor asks.

"Sure. We have enough reserve power to run life-support for sixteen more hours, with enough juice left to get outside of their radar range. And as long as we set our course right with the alignment of the moon, they won't detect us."

"And we can contact the Crossroads as soon as those ships leave orbit?"

"Yup."

Trevor shrugs. "I guess we've waited this long to be rescued, we can wait a bit longer."

Trevor leans back and looks out his window at the inside of the crater they were parked in. It was not very interesting at all. Very dark, the only light being the light coming off of the runabout's red and green running lights.

Trevor did see something that worried him while looking out of that window.

Foster.

Foster had left the ship and was standing out in the crater. He was looking at the sky.

"What's he doing?"

Foster begins to glow.

"What-"

He starts to fade out.

"-the-"

He disappears.

"-hell?"

Foster was gone. Trevor looked around frantically. "Ami, where did he go?"

"I don't know."

"Why didn't you tell me he was leaving?"

"He didn't tell me he was leaving either."

"BAH!" Trevor groaned. "Scan for him!"

"That will require a proactive scan. They will be able to detect us."

"I don't care. I want to know where he went."

Trevor realized that he didn't want Foster to leave. It seemed that Trevor had grown accustomed to Foster being there.

"There is no need for any scans." Foster stated.

"GOOD GOD!" Trevor screamed. "You scared the hell out of me!"

Foster sat back down and shrugged. "Sorry."

"Do you still want me to run that scan?" The computer asked.

"No you idiot!" Trevor snapped.

"BAH!" The computer replied.

Trevor rolled his eyes and squatted down in front of Foster.

"You don't need to be sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry I yelled at you earlier. I know you were only doing what you thought I wanted you to do."

Foster looked up at Trevor. "I fixed things."

"Huh?" Trevor asked.

"I went back and put life back into those people."

"You can do that?"

Foster laughed. "You make it sound hard. Humanoid life is nothing but electrical currents."

"Well, maybe physiologically. But LIFE is much more than that."

"See." Foster sighed. "That's what I don't understand. Your people are killing each other and others even though your lives are so important."

Trevor sits all the way on the ground.

"I had no intention on leaving those people dead. My people understand the meaning of life – the preciousness of life. When you yelled at me, I came to realize that you understand the preciousness, just not the meaning."

"Huh?" Trevor asked.

"Ever look at the stars and go, why am I here?" Foster mused.

"Not lately. After the war I am just glad I am here."

Foster laughed. "Do you know why you are here?"

Trevor thought about this for a moment. "According to science, I'm here to multiply."

"Science is meaningless when it comes to the meaning of life. We are here for others. It's got nothing to do with yourself. Life was created to supplement other life."

Trevor cocked his head. "I'm not following."

Foster smiled. "You're not supposed to. It took my people eons to figure it out."

The look on Trevor's face could only be described as utter confusion.

"Trevor, was Ami happy when you two were together?"

Trevor thought back. "She never complained. Well, except when I came back from the gym."

Foster grinned. "Do you believe in soul mates?"

"No." Trevor groaned. He then eyed Foster. "Should I?"

Foster just grinned. "It's not about you."

"Good morning!" A sweet female voice states to a Sisko crewman in the corridor of deck eight.

A very frightened crewmember cowers in preparation for the beating he is about to receive.

Until he realizes that she just said 'good morning.'

"Uh, good morning Commander Hino." He cautiously replies.

Raye smiles at him and continued her trek to her office. The crewman looks at another who watched the exchange.

"You should go buy a lotto ticket. You're obviously having a very lucky day." The watcher states.

The other man just nods as he watches Raye hug another crewman who had dove for cover.

Raye finally reaches her office and steps in. She sees Jeff sitting at his desk.

"Commander! Good morning!"

"Good morning, Jeff!" Raye grins as she sits down at her desk.

"So what's on tap for today?"

Raye checks her computer. "Well, we don't have any patience's today. And considering we are under a security alert, we won't have any walk ins, so I figured you could help me with this."

Raye tosses a PADD over to Jeff. He begins to read it.

"Letter of resignation? I thought we talked about this."

Raye nods. "We talked about a lot. I think you and I both know that this is the wrong job for me. I'm no councilor. It's simply a resignation from this post."

"I don't think there are any other positions open on this ship. Do you really want to be taken away from your friends?"

Raye sighed. "Well, I doubt two of them would really care that much."

"Have you even talked to them?" Jeff asked.

Raye scowled. "You know, you have just as good of an ability to piss people off as you do cheer them up."

"It's a gift. Now, you need to talk to them."

"Now?" Raye asked, pointing to the flashing red lights.

"Eh, well as soon as the situation warrants."

"Fine. But I am still turning that in." Raye states while pointing to the PADD in Jeff's hand.

"If you think that's best."

"I do." Raye nods.

"Well I am not going to try and talk you out of it then." Jeff says, tossing the PADD back to Raye. "Just make sure you tie up all your loose ends before leaving."

"I might not have to leave." Raye replies.

"No, you might get to stay, but regardless, loose shoelaces will make you fall and break your nose."

Raye just laughed. "Confucius you ain't."

Jeff laughed as well.

George just laughs as Kodachi mauls a restrained Ranma with kisses. Ranma tries and tries to fend the assault off, but to no avail.

Akane glowers at the display as she kicks Kuno across the room once more. "RANMA!"

"Yeah, I'm tied up here, Akane." Ranma groans.

Akane rolls her eyes as she sends Kuno across the room again. Kuno hops up again, but instead of running back to Akane, he walks over to Ranma. He pulls his sister off of him.

Kodachi starts to object, but George pulls her aside.

"I heard Ranma say that he would LOVE to see you in that new dress you got!" George lied.

Kodachi beamed. "I'll be back in six minutes!"

Kodachi fluttered out of the room, black rose pedals a flying. One of the Kuno drones quickly follows her out, sweeping up the pedals.

"My drones are not janitors." Kuno objected.

"It's him or you, dude." George dryly states.

Kuno grunts. "Very well."

George rolls his eyes and walks into another room. Kuno grins at his adversary.

"Where is the pigtailed girl? What have you done with her?" Kuno demanded.

"Idano." Ranma mumbled.

George walks back into the room with a bucket. "Hey Tatewaki! Look over there!" He points in the direction of a hallway.

Kuno, stupid as usual, looks in the direction he was pointed. George quickly douses Ranma with the water, making him female. Kuno groans at the trick.

"Fool me, will you-"Kuno shuts up when he sees a very wet female Ranma right in front of him.

"OH PIG TAILED GIRL!" Kuno exclaims, glomping onto Ranma with all his force.

"GET OFF ME!" Ranma-Chan yells.

Kuno snuggles Ranma some more, finally burying his head between her breasts. Ranma snaps.

"EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!" She screams.

Ranma forces the ropes that are binding her to snap. She then sends Kuno flying through a wall and into the next room.

"YUCK!" She exclaims.

"RANMA!" Akane bellows.

"Oh, sorry." Ranma says as she runs over and begins to untie Akane. George stays where he is and watches the pair.

"Are you okay?" Ranma asks Akane.

Akane nods and grabs Ranma's head. She pulls him close and gives him a kiss.

"I knew you'd come for me." She whispers.

Ranma smiles and the pair kiss once again.

"OH MY GOD!" A now bandaged Kuno cries as he crawls through the hole he had just made in the wall. He turns to George. "And you said it would only happen in my dreams!"

George smiles and shrugs. Kuno opens his arms wide and grabs the pair.

"The three of us! Together at last!" Kuno hollers.

Simultaneously Ranma and Akane send Kuno flying through the hole that one of the drones had just repaired. The drone watches his likeness shatter the wall. He sighs and begins his repairs.

"Come on, let's get out of here." Ranma said, helping Akane to her feet.

"Oh, wait ten seconds, please." George asks.

"WHAT? NO!" Ranma yells.

"Okay, don't. But I don't know where you think you're going. You don't have your communicators."

Ranma groans.

"D'oh!" Akane grumbles.

"WRETCHED PIG TAILED GIRL!" Kodachi screams as she comes plowing into the room, knocking the repair drone through the hole he just finished patching.

"Ugh." Ranma groans.

"What have you done with my darling Ranma?" Kodachi demanded.

"He left." Ranma stated.

"WHAT?"

"He said he was going to go buy flowers for the pig tailed girl." George lied.

"DID HE NOW?" Kodachi scowled.

"Yup. And Akane Tendo!" George grinned.

"NOT IF THEY ARE BOTH DEAD!" Kodachi screamed, ripping off her dress and stripping down to her rhythmic gymnastic outfit. She whips out her ribbons and quickly wraps the two together. She then pulls out a sword and prepares to strike a mighty blow.

"Now, now." George says, walking over and grabbing the sword out of her hand. "No need for that. Having them tied up will be plenty for now."

Ranma and Akane groan and slide to the floor together. Kodachi flutters off to change once again, with the usual flower shower trailing behind her.

The worker drone slowly crawls through the hole in the wall and grabs a broom and dustpan and follows Kodachi out.

"You will never get away with this." Ranma grunts while trying to get out of her bindings.

"Oh yeah?" George grins. "Soon as we get the engines back online we're out of here."

"Then what? Going to use the secret weapon on Earth?" Ranma asks.

"Huh?" George asks. Then he remembers. "Oh, no secret weapon. Just a scheme to get you out here. Would you believe that Tatewaki thought of it? Amazing that it worked!"

"That is impressive." Ranma mused. Akane gives an elbow to the ribs to get her back on topic. "What I mean is that the Sisko will not let you leave the system. And Lita, Shampoo and Ryouga are on the ship. They will make there way up here."

"Shampoo is in there, much in the same state you're in." George said pointing to a door labeled 'closet'. "As for the other two, they are preoccupied at the moment."

Ranma grumbles. "Well, you know if we don't return before too long the Sisko will send more security personal over."

George just shrugs. "Whatever you want to believe."

George laughs and starts to walk away. He stops and looks Ranma over once more before he leaves.

"I don't know why you bother turning back into a boy. You've got a great rack." George starts laughing again and leaves the room.

Ranma attempts to flip George off, but ends up only jamming his finger into Akane's back. Akane grumbles and turns her head as much as she can to look at Ranma. "You brought Ryouga?"


	8. Atonement

_CHAPTER SEVEN - ATONEMENT_

"It's been an hour." The tactical officer informs Mina.

She looks at the clock above the view screen and sighs. _The captain told me to give him two hours before sending over any more help, but he should have checked in by now._

Mina sighs once more and looks back to the tactical station. "Ten minutes. If you don't hear anything, send the security teams."

The officer nods and begins to punch orders into his computer. Mina slumps down into her chair.

The turbo lift doors on the back of the bridge open up and Raye walks in and looks around. She sees everyone busy at their stations.

She sighs. _Maybe later._ She thinks to her self. She turns back around and hits the call button on the turbo lift.

"Hi Raye!" Serena says from her station. Raye turns and smiles at Serena.

"Sorry." Serena states as she turns back to her work.

The she realized that Raye didn't scowl at her.

She smiled.

Serena hops up in just enough time to stop the turbo lift doors from closing. She grabs Raye's arm and pulls her back onto the bridge.

"How are you?" Serena asks as she leads Raye over to her station.

"I'm –" Raye pauses to think for a moment. "Better."

Serena smiles and gives her a hug. "Whatcha doing up here for anyway?"

"Yeah." Mina says from her seat.

Raye sighs. "Do you have a minute?"

Mina nods and motions for Raye to follow her into the conference room. Serena starts to follow, but Mina stops her.

"You have the bridge, Serena."

Serena's eyes go wide as saucers. "Me?"

"Her?" The rest of the bridge crew asks.

Mina just growls at them as she leads Raye off into the conference room.

Serena looks around and smiles as she goes to have a seat in the captain's chair.

The entire bridge crew just continues to look at her as she makes herself comfortable.

"As you were." She states.

The crew eyes each other worriedly as they resume their duties.

Mina sits down in the chair at the far end of the conference table. She leans back and crosses her legs. Raye continues to stand, and looks out the window.

"Can I be informal with you?" Raye asks, continuing to look out into space.

"Of course." Mina states.

Raye sighs and turns to Mina.

"A lot has happened to me over the past six months. A lot of changes. A lot of things that I wasn't expecting. A lot of things that I was not prepared for. Because of this, I have been, for lack of a better phrase, a reclusive bitch."

Mina doesn't nod, but certainly agrees with that statement.

"I have learned a lot over the last couple of weeks. About myself that I didn't know before. I learned that I can be selfish and cold, without taking into account what other people feel. I always thought I was just out going and forward, but now I know that I was rude and insensitive."

Raye softly begins to cry. Mina shifts uncomfortably in her seat.

"Did you ever notice how people act when I pass them by? How they try their damnedest to avoid me? Is this why the only man I could get was a ruthless killer that was supposed to marry my best friend?"

Raye was no longer softly crying. She was now crying in full force. Mina stands and starts to walk over to her.

"I spent the most important years of my life treating my friends like something I stepped in. And through it all, none of them deserted me. I deserted them.

"It's changing now, though." Raye bawled.

"Oh... Raye..." Mina sniffled as she embraced her friend. "We forgive you. You know that we do."

Raye inhaled deeply and cleared her eyes. "I need to help."

"I don't really know if there is anything you can do." Mina said.

"You are sending another boarding party over. I want to go."

Mina grimaced. "I don't know."

"You know damned well I can fight. I know Lita is over there and I need to be able to help her - since I refused to help her before."

Mina sighed and nodded just as her communicator chirped.

"Mina?" Serena asked.

"Yeah?" Mina asked back.

"Weapons guy says it's been 10 minutes."

Mina laughed. "Tell him to stand by; one more member of the boarding party is on her way."

"Uh, he said he heard you."

Mina laughed again and closed the channel.

"Good luck." Mina told Raye.

Raye nods and takes off running through the conference room, across the bridge and into the turbo lift.

Lita tossed one of the phaser rifles that was dropped when her bosses disappeared to Ryouga. He quickly takes aim at the drones and prepares to fire.

"Wait!" Lita screams.

Ryouga shifts his eyes towards her. "Why?"

"We need to come up with a plan. If we just shoot at them randomly they will adapt before we have killed all of them." She explains.

"Fair enough, so what's the plan?" Ryouga asks.

"Still working on it."

Ryouga groans as one of the drones charges them. He promptly fires and hits it dead center. The drone begins to spark and falls to the ground.

"One down, ninety nine to go!" Ryouga chuckles cynically.

"Okay, got it." Lita points to the floor where she has drawn up a hockey style game plan.

"We are going to go straight down the middle, forcing the drones on the side to swing at us, hopefully killing each other." Lita grins.

"Hopefully?"

"Well." Lita chuckles nervously. "No plan is 100% fool proof."

Ryouga nods. "On your command."

Lita nods back. "Let's roll."

Ryouga and Lita both begin firing. They start to take out the first batch of drones in the front. The plan begins to take fold. The drones on the side start to move in behind them as the other drones swing at them, causing a massive pile of Kuno drones on the floor. After exhausting all their phaser rifles and the hand phaser Ryouga brought with him all the drones lay dead on the floor.

"Hey it worked!" Lita stated, partially surprised.

Ryouga, panting from the running they did to get through the drones, nods.

Lita slowly walks up to the hatch to get to the command deck. She looks up and sees nothing. Slowly she climbs the ladder and sticks her head out at the command deck.

"Looks clear." She calls down to Ryouga.

Ryouga climbs up the ladder underneath Lita and watches her finish climbing.

"Nice." He quietly grins to himself.

"What's that, Ensign?" Lita calls back.

"Ice." Ryouga lies. "I feel hot and could use some ice."

"Oh." Lita replies as she pulls herself up out of the hatch. She helps Ryouga up as well, and then pulls out her tricorder.

After studying it for a moment she points down a short hallway, only about a hundred meters and grins.

"Through that door is the main control center. In there I am picking up four bio-signs."

"Is one of them Akane?"

Lita rolls her eyes. "I think so."

"Well what are we waiting for?" Ryouga goes to pull out his hand phaser, and then realizes that he doesn't have it any more.

"Dammit." Ryouga groans at Lita. "Did you take the fact that we don't have weapons anymore into your plan?"

Lita chuckles. "Well, yes. We will just have to do this the old fashioned way."

Lita cracks her knuckles and points to the door.

"Charge!" She yells.

"Who are you?" Kodachi asks.

Both Ryouga and Lita stop in their tracks.

"I asked, WHO ARE YOU?" Kodachi yells. "And what are you doing on the great and noble cube of Kuno?"

"I'm Commander Lita Gosnell of the USS Sisko. We are here to retrieve our crew members."

"So..." Kodachi glowers. "You are in love with my darling Ranma as well."

"Huh?" Lita asks.

"Shame on you. A married woman." Ryouga scolds.

Lita promptly stooge slaps Ryouga and returns her attention to Kodachi. "Captain Saotome needs to return to his ship, and I am here to make sure that happens whether you like it or not."

Kodachi laughs at Lita's smugness. "Is that so?" Kodachi promptly rips off the dress she was wearing and strips down to her rhythmic gymnastics uniform.

"What?" Lita ponders as Kodachi throws a rubber ball at Lita. Lita easily dodges it and it hits the ground.

The ball explodes.

"What the hell?" Lita asks as the air fills up with a pepper like mist.

"Paralysis powder." Kodachi grins as both Lita and Ryouga fall to the ground. "Now, to finish you both off so that Ranma and I can be together forever!"

"Yup, boned." Ryouga grumbles while struggling to move.

Lita starts to move her arm. She manages to grab her tricorder and flips it open. She punches in a series of keys with her moveable arm and shoves the tricorder close to Kodachi.

Kodachi walks over, kicks the tricorder behind her and draws her katana.

"So, the powder doesn't completely affect you then, does it?" Kodachi begins to cackle. "That's okay; my sword will take care of that!"

Lita hits her communicator just as Kodachi begins the upward motion of the sword. The tricorder beeps three times, and then explodes.

Kodachi is knocked forward in the blast, where she looses her grip on the blade. It falls, narrowly avoiding giving Ryouga a circumcision, and sticks into the ground.

Lita gets her leg moving and promptly kicks Kodachi over Ryouga. Kodachi growls.

"SUCH INSOLENCE!" She bellows.

Suddenly about one hundred Kodachi drones appear in front of the door to the control room. Kodachi cackles and disappears into the drones.

"Try and take my darling Ranma away from me now!"

Lita manages to start moving all her limbs again. She slowly staggers to her feet and pulls the sword out of the deck. She then drags Ryouga who is starting to regain movement, behind her.

"How come the powder didn't affect you?" Ryouga pondered as he was being drug.

"While in Section 31 training I was drugged with just about every powder available. I developed a resistance." Lita replied as she dropped Ryouga and took up a defensive stance in front of him.

Ryouga nodded as he began to stagger to his feet. "Plan?"

Lita shrugged. "Kill 'em all?"

Ryouga grinned as the first drone attacked.

"They are made out of metal, right?"

"Yeah." Lita replied.

"Ha." Ryouga smiled and he flipped over Lita and landed on the first drone.

"BAKUSAI TENKETSU!" Ryouga screamed, placing his finger on the drone. It looked up at him and glowered, right before exploding, sending blue ooze and black rose pedals everywhere.

Lita followed, slicing and dicing the drones as they attacked.

But more and more drones were materializing as the others are killed.

"How many could there possibly be?" Ryouga gasped, dodging a katana strike from one of the drones.

"I don't know, but we will never get through them at this rate." Lita grumbled.

Ryouga back flipped and landed next to Lita. The pair is forced backwards several meters, almost to the other end of the corridor.

Lita sighed. "It's a shame you don't have a ki attack like Ranma has."

"I do." Ryouga acknowledged. "But I need to be very depressed to use it, and I'm not."

Lita grinned. "Is that because you made it with Mina?"

Ryouga turned stoplight red.

"Seriously though, if we don't get through them Akane and the others will be stuck here forever."

Ryouga nodded. "Akane being stuck here for ever makes me upset. But Ranma being stuck here forever counters it."

Lita pondered what she could say that would make Ryouga so depressed that he could blast his way through the wall of drones.

Lita noticed her wedding ring out of the corner of her eye. She looked at it and smiled.

"Ryouga, no one has told you this yet, and it was supposed to remain a secret, but I think you're ready."

Ryouga raised an eyebrow. "Yeah?"

"Akane and Ranma are married."

Ryouga lowered the eyebrow and grinned.

"Nice try."

"No, seriously." Lita said as she begins to dig something out of her pocket. "See, it's me and Gosnell at their wedding."

Ryouga eyes the picture. It shows Lita on the left, smiling as Gosnell is behind her giving her bunny ears. On the right side of the picture are Ranma and Akane. Kissing.

"When???" Ryouga stammered.

"Several weeks ago."

Ryouga started to turn blue. "Ranma..."

"He's that way." Lita encouraged Ryouga by pointing the way through the drones.

"RANMA!!!!!!!!!!" Ryouga screams.

An extremely large glowing orb appears on his palms as blue flames start to weft off of him.

The drones all look at each other in fear.

"Oh shit!" They cry in unison as the orb grows to human size.

"SHISHIHOUKOUDAN!" Ryouga screams, sending the orb through the drones and the wall behind them.

"No worries, family." Kodachi informs George and Tatewaki. "The intruders are stuck behind a battalion of superior Kodachi drones."

"Are you calling my drones lack luster quality?" Tatewaki demands.

"Well look! He hasn't even fixed that wall yet, brother dear." Kodachi exclaims pointing to the drone that has been put on clean up patrol.

"I will have you know –"Kuno starts.

"SHISHIHOUKOUDAN!" Ryouga's voice is heard through the walls.

Ranma starts to rock back and forth. Akane tries to stop him.

"What are you doing?" Akane demands.

"We want to be flat." Ranma replies and tips the two girls over.

George looks up from his terminal and towards the sound, and now rumbling.

"What the-" George doesn't have a chance to finish.

The wall to the command center is blown into a million pieces. The blast continues past the group and through the next wall. And the next. And the next.

"HULL BREECH, COMMAND DECK!" The tactical officer yells as debris comes flying out of the side of the Kuno cube.

"JESUS!" Mina screams, hopping out of her seat. "Scan for life signs!"

"One!" The officer replies.

"Transport-"

"Already done."

"Good job." Mina states. Serena stands and looks at Mina who is on her way back to the turbo lift. Mina looks at her. "Take the bridge."

Serena nods and rushes to her seat while Mina goes down the turbo lift.

In sickbay a doctor is examining a man on the bed. "How are you feeling?" The doctor asks.

"Cold." The man replies.

The doors to sickbay open and Mina walks in, followed by thirty security officers.

"Who are you?" Mina asks.

George sits up on the bio-bed. George is no worse for the wear, with the exception of his clothes being torn and a big lump on his forehead. He also has the appearance of being scorched from top to bottom.

"I'm George Kuno, of the Kuno Collective. Thanks a lot for saving my ass out there."

Mina nods. "Yeah, sure. Now, where are our people?"

George lies back down. "If they are still alive after that blast, they are in the command center."

Mina nods to a security guard who promptly scoots off to inform the others.

"Do you have emergency force shields on that deck?" Mina asks.

"Yeah, but they won't last for long. The ship will shut down for its regeneration cycle in thirty minutes."

"Thirty minutes? You may have been cutting it very close."

"No, once the ships in its regeneration cycle it transfers all power from life support to the shields and the regeneration cells. The engines would then be completely repaired in six minutes. I then had it set to prematurely come out of its cycle, cloak, warp off, and then finish."

George sighs. "It was the perfect plan. Just didn't plan on THAT!" George waves his arms to simulate the explosion.

"Why are you being so helpful? You do realize that you are under arrest, don't you?"

George laughs. "Man, I am getting to old for this crap and dealing with those maniacs. Take me to jail."

Mina shrugs to one of the security officers. She then turns to the doctor. "Treat him." She turns back to the guard. "Keep and eye on him, and as soon as he is released take him to the brig."

The guard nods and Mina walks off. She hits her communicator.

"Aino to Hino."

Raye slinks forward to a doorway when her communicator chirps. She signals to the others to stop.

"Go."

"Are you okay?"

"Yeah." Raye acknowledged. "Little plaster fell on our heads and some steam hit us from the pointless steam ducts, but we are okay."

"Good." Mina's voice sighed. "Do you detect any bio-signs on deck above you?"

"Yeah, seven." Raye stated looking at her wrist mounted tricorder.

"Good they are still alive." Mina sighed in relief. "Your team will have less than thirty minutes to get them and proceed to the beam out point. After that the environmental force shield will collapse, and all life support will be diverted to the shields."

"Got it. Out." Raye stated. She then turned to her team of twenty soldiers. "You heard the lady, thirty minutes."

She received a silent acknowledgement from the people on her team as they made there way down the corridor and to a hatch. Two of the soldiers walked up and started to push on the hatch.

"It won't budge!" One stated.

_One Deck Up_

What is left of the ceiling is lying on the floor, on top of the hatch. Ryouga and Lita both lie unconscious next to it.

_One Deck Down_

Raye inspects her tricorder. "There is several tons of debris lying on the hatch."

"It will take us hours to cut a new hole." A soldier states.

"Yeah, so we will need to find another way." Raye replies. She checks her tricorder again. "There is a turbo lift shaft eighty meters that way."

Raye points down a darkened corridor. Six of the soldiers nod and put on their night vision gear. They make their way to the lift and pry the doors open. They look in.

"No access ladder." One states.

"The actual lift is three decks above us." Another one adds.

Raye comes over and checks her tricorder. "Shit, and it's coming off its tracks. It could fall at any minute."

The soldiers all look at each other as Raye tries to come up with a plan.

"SNORT!" Trevor snores. Foster, who had been reading about human history begins to laugh.

Trevor begins to stir from the noise of Foster's boisterous laugh.

"Whaaaa?" Trevor grumbles.

"Your people make such funny noises when you are regenerating yourselves."

"He's usually mumbling about Ami." Ami computer pipes in.

Trevor swings to take a bat at the computer but ends up just whacking his hand on the console. After swearing for a few moments he yawns and walks over to his seat behind the controls of the Runabout.

"Are they still out there?" Trevor asks.

"Yes." Ami Computer replies. "They are still in a high orbit."

"They haven't searched at all?"

"No."

Trevor looks at Foster. "What do you think they are up to?"

"I could go ask them." Foster replies.

Trevor shakes his head. "No, I think that will probably make things worse, rather than better."

Foster nods. "Well, in my opinion, I think they are hoping that you will come back, and they will grab you when you do."

Trevor laughs. "Well, let them hope!"

Foster laughs along with Trevor till some alarm bells go off. Both of the pair stop laughing and simultaneously look down at the sensor screen.

"What the hell?" They both ask Ami Computer.

"There is an unidentified ship traveling at warp two into the system. I don't recognize the configuration, but it's constructed of the same materials of the other ships in high orbit."

"What does this mean?" Foster asks.

"It means they have warp drive and we are getting the hell out of here." Trevor states as the power up the thrusters and begins to lift off of the moons surface.

"Ten seconds to intercept." Ami Computer states.

"Hail the Crossroads!" Trevor yells.

"They're jamming!" Ami Computer replies.

"SHIT! FULL IMPULSE! GO!"

The Runabout lifts off and starts to zip towards the crossroads as the Zima ship drops out of warp, and nails the Runabout with a tractor beam.

"They got us!" Foster states.

Trevor starts pushing buttons, firing the thrusters and impulse engines, in a feeble attempt to dislodge the Runabout from the larger ships grasp.

A red pulse runs down the tractor beam and slams into the Runabout. Trevor's ship goes dark. The engines shut down and the thrusters refuse to respond.

"Computer, status!"

No reply.

All of the panels on the Runabout go dark.

"Shit." Trevor groans.

The tractor beam from the Zima ship begins to shorten. A bay door opens and the Runabout is pulled towards it.

"HAIL THEM!" Ark orders as Ami comes bolting onto the bridge.

"No response!" The communications officer replies.

Ami pushes Ark aside and stands right behind the helmsman. "Open a channel."

"Open."

"Unidentified vessel, release that scout ship or prepare to be fired upon." Ami ordered.

The viewer shows the Runabout still slowly being pulled towards the open bay door.

"Target the tractor emitter and fire." Ami orders.

The weapons officer complies.

A phaser blast sprays from the forward phaser emitter on the larger Sovereign class starship and impacts the tractor emitter. A small explosion results and the tractor beam disengages.

"Grab them." Ark orders Vong. Vong starts to comply as the communications officer speaks up.

"They are hailing us."

"On screen." Ami responds.

"EXPLAIN YOURSELF FIRE ON MY SHIP!" A man on the other end, who is red as a beet, screams.

"I am Captain Ami Mizuno of the Federation Starship USS Crossroads. You were attempting to take Federation property and a Federation citizen."

"You can keep the ship." The man replies. "But I demand you return your 'Federation Citizen' to us for prosecution."

"What crime?"

The man pulls out a sheet of paper. "He has warrants for his arrest for violation of the mental health charter section nine, subsection four paragraph six sub paragraph nine sentence five sub-sentence fourteen."

"Huh?" Ami asks.

"He was talking to himself. That's a class one felony. Then there are the escape charges, the assault on Zima Confederacy security officers, trespassing – should I continue?"

"They are on board." Ark quietly informs Ami. Ami looks back and silently mouths "They?" to Ark. Ark shrugs and walks off. Ami returns her attention to the man on the screen.

"If you would like to come aboard I am sure we can work this out." Ami asks.

"A plea agreement? Is that what you think?" The man asks.

"A compromise. I think that it is fairly obvious to you that you are not going to come out of an armed conflict in good shape. We wish to respect your laws, but you have to understand all the facts." Ami smiles.

"Well, I can't do anything with you, but I will go and pick up a magistrate, and we will meet back here in one hour to work out your 'compromise'." The captain states. The channel then closes and the ship turns around and heads back towards the planet.

"Ma'am?" Vong chimes in.

"Yes?"

"The Sisko is asking if we have any rock climbing equipment on board."

"Do we?" Ami asks.

"Yes."

"Then tell them yes."

Vong pauses. "I'm sorry, they also want to know if they can use it."

"Yes, set a course over to them."

Vong pauses again. "The people on the cube need it."

Ami nods to Vong, not really caring what he is saying anymore. She walks up to the tactical officer. "Have security escort the Runabout passengers to the deck two observation room."

He nods as Ami walks into the turbo lift.

"Fifteen minutes." One of the soldiers states to another who is waiting in a large open area.

"Yeah, yeah." He grumbles.

A familiar noise is heard and in an instant a blue flash of light is turned into the rock climbing equipment that they had requested.

The two soldiers quickly scoop up the equipment and bring it over to the turbo lift shaft. At the shaft two soldiers are shooting the rails right below the lift, causing the rails to glow a hot red.

"Any minute now." Raye mentions.

Within seconds the heated metal bends and the lift drops past them and down the several decks with a bone shattering crash at the bottom of the shaft.

The soldiers waste no time in setting up the climbing equipment. One works on using magnetic pads they got from the Crossroads to climb the side of the shaft.

He comes up right below the door to the command deck and drills three pegs into the wall. He then connects ropes to the pegs and allows the free end to drop down to the others.

He then finds the inside emergency release for the doors and releases them. He draws his weapon as he opens the door.

The deck is dark. The solider activates his night vision and pulls himself up. He looks around and does not see any people. Down a couple hundred meters though he can see where the hull of the ship was breeched.

Raye pulls herself up and begins to scan with her tricorder. "Two that way." She points in the opposite direction of the hole. Six soldiers go off to find the two. The rest come with Raye.

"Five up here." Raye states.

The group walks a few meters when Raye's communicator chirps.

"Go."

"We have Commander Hino and Ensign Hibiki." A solider states.

"Take them to the beam out point and transport back."

"Yes ma'am."

They continue down the corridor till they reach a pile of Kodachi drones on the floor. Raye scans them.

"One here."

A couple of the soldiers start to pull the drones off the pile while the rest stand ready to shoot. After a few seconds there are no more in the pile.

"DEATH TO YOU!" Kodachi screams as she hops up from the pile and charges the group. Everyone simultaneously turns and fires on Kodachi. Some of the shots deflect off of her, but several impact her, sending her flying across the corridor.

A field medic walks up and checks her for a pulse. He looks to Raye and shakes his head.

Raye nods and motions for the group to continue following.

After continuing down the corridor for about a hundred more meters they come to what appears to be the remains of the central control room.

CLANG 

"What was that?" Whispered Raye.

CLANG 

"It's coming from over there." One of the group whispers back while pointing at a door in the opposite corner.

Raye slowly walks over to it and checks her tricorder. "One bio-sign."

CLANG 

Raye draws her weapon and nods to another guard who hits the door release.

The doors slide open. Raye lowers her weapon.

"Commander." Raye acknowledges.

A solider kneels down and begins to remove the rope and duct tape keeping Shampoo immobile and silent. Once unbound, Shampoo stands and puts her arms out.

"Give Shampoo rifle." Shampoo ordered.

Raye shakes her head. "Sorry Commander. You need to return to the ship and go to sickbay."

Raye nods to a couple of the soldiers. Shampoo begins to protest but the guards promptly lead her off and back towards the turbo lift shaft.

Raye and the remaining soldiers walk towards the open hull. Once at it, Raye touches the force shield simply to verify that there was one there.

She then checks her tricorder. "Under this pile of stuff there are three."

The soldiers nod. One of them checks his tricorder as the others start to pull off debris.

"Four minutes."

Raye nods as she stands ready to fire. Within thirty seconds the pile was off. Ranma-Chan and Akane were both unconscious, with Akane having a gash on her forehead that was still bleeding slightly. Ranma appeared to be okay, with the obvious exception that she had an unconscious Kuno wrapped around her.

The soldiers quickly cut the binds. Two of them hurriedly carry Akane off. The others can't seem to pry Kuno off of the captain.

"Can you wake her up?" Raye asked the field medic.

He nods and pulls out a hypospray. He zaps Ranma with it. After a few seconds Ranma weakly opens her eyes.

"What happened?" She slowly asks.

"Explosion." Raye acknowledges. "We're getting you off of here, but there is just one problem."

Ranma smiles. "Commander Hino. Nice to see you again."

"Yes, ma'am - sir. But, about the problem."

Ranma continues to smile as she notices Kuno holding her.

"Isn't that cute?" She asks.

"Sir?" Raye asks.

The field medic runs a quick scan. "He, uh, she has a concussion."

Raye nods. "Can you wake him up too?"

The medic complies and injects Kuno. Within a few seconds Kuno is awakened.

"Oh... Pig tailed girl..." Kuno moans.

"Kuno baby?" Ranma asks.

Kuno wakes right up and sits up, letting go of Ranma in the process. "Pig tailed girl! Oh how I love you!"

Raye shoots Kuno before he has a chance to grab Ranma once again. Kuno falls over unconscious.

"KUNO BABY!" Ranma yells.

Raye nods to the medic who quickly sedates Ranma. The remaining soldiers quickly assist and rush off with Ranma.

Raye takes one last look out of the hole. She smiles and laughs when she sees the Crossroads pull to within a few hundred meters of the Kuno cube.

"Better late than never!"

"Commander!" Raye's communicator chirps. Raye realizes how much time she has, or doesn't have, left and begins to run back towards the turbo lift shaft.

"Right behind you –"Raye is cut off by the sudden sound of the force field deactivating.

Debris begins to blow out of the hull breech. Raye is no exception. She is blown towards the hole. She manages to grab a hold of a stool stand for one of the consoles. She takes a deep breath and holds it.

Once all the air is evacuated from the area Raye swiftly lets go of the only thing that kept her from blowing out into space, and begins to run back to the turbo lift.

Raye quickly becomes very weak from the running and the lack of oxygen. The temperature on the cube has also dropped well below zero degrees, and is dropping more every second.

Raye slides down the rope and swings in to the deck. She crashes to the ground, forcing the air out of her. She makes it no more than twenty meters before falling to the ground.

Raye looks towards the transport zone, surrounded by the transport enhancers, and sees it clear. As she starts blacks out she smiles, for she knows that she helped save several lives.

Her smile fades as she neared death.

She knew that this was to be expected.

For her to be here, freezing, on the floor.

Alone.

She saw it coming.

She knows what goes around, comes around.


	9. Resolution

_CHAPTER EIGHT – RESOLUTION_

"A CANING???" Trevor exclaimed as he flailed his arms wildly around the conference room.

Ami watched Trevor throw his tantrum for a few moments. When Trevor finally calmed down Ami continued with her explanation.

"That was the lowest that we could talk them down to. Since somehow no one you shot was hurt, they will forgo the escape, assault and various other charges, but they insisted in convicting you of the mental illness charge.

"And after the crap you pulled I can understand why. And I am not even going to begin to go into the trouble you would have been in with Starfleet if this planet hadn't just been a colony of an already warp capable society."

Trevor eyed Foster in the corner of the room, and then turned his attention back to Ami.

"Man, think how bad off humanity would be if we caned everyone with a mental illness." Trevor pondered.

Ami scowled at Trevor. "You should know better than to judge a society. Have you forgotten everything I taught you?" Ami asked.

Trevor sighed. "But a caning?"

"Jeeze, Trevor. Don't be such a pussy." Ami grumbled.

Foster began to chuckle. Ami looked over at him and then back to Trevor.

"It's not till tomorrow, so go enjoy your last meal and I will hook up with you later. I need to talk to your friend here."

Trevor nodded and stood. He shot a grin at Ami and walked out the door. Ami then also stood and walked to a chair that was closer to Foster.

"So, what's your story?" She asked.

Foster chuckled. "My story is long and boring. I'd much rather hear your story."

"My story?"

Foster nodded. "How come you and Trevor aren't together anymore?"

Ami sighed and turned away, only to find Foster sitting in the chair across from her.

"You know he loves you, don't you?"

Ami looks up at Foster.

"How can he still love me?"

Foster grins. "You still love him."

Ami sighs once more. "Of course I do. But I-"

Foster shakes his head. "Someday. Someday your species will learn that it's not about the I's and Me's, it's about the you's."

Foster stands. "You make him happy, he makes you happy. I just don't understand why your kind can't figure it out!"

"Figure what out?" Ami asks, confused.

"That." Foster says. "To paraphrase a song from Earth's history, you were made for him, and he was made for you."

Ami blushes.

"Jewel, I believe." Foster ponders.

Ami grins, still blushing.

"Good luck, Captain." Foster tells Ami, as he starts to walk out.

"Where are you going?"

Foster stops and looks to Ami. "To say good bye to Trevor. He's improved my life, and I hope that I have improved his.

"If you need any more guidance, Trevor knows where to find me. But hopefully, if you have learned anything, you won't need my help. You will help each other."

Foster winks at Ami and walks out of the room.

Ami can only sit there, thinking about what Foster just said, and how she felt. How she has been feeling since the start of the Dominion War.

A tear rolls down Ami's face as she gets up and runs out of the room.

Trevor lies in his bed in his guest quarters. He simply is staring at the ceiling. His mind racing with the thought of being beaten with a stick.

Sure, it was only going to be 10 lashes, but still. It will probably hurt like hell.

"Shit, I am a pussy." Trevor mumbles.

"Hello."

Trevor jumped as Foster floated above him.

"DON'T BLOODY DO THAT!" He yells.

Foster grins as he floats down and has a seat in the chair next to Trevor's bed.

"I've come to say good-bye." Foster grinned.

"Good-bye? Why?"

"I've repaid my debt to you."

Trevor shakes his head. "You didn't owe me anything to begin with."

Foster shrugs. "Maybe not, but still. Do a good deed. What goes around, comes around, yada yada."

Trevor laughs. Foster continues.

"If you ever need any assistance, or just someone to chat with, you remember where to find me?"

Trevor nods.

"Good."

Trevor hops up and gives Foster a hug. "Thanks for all your help."

Foster nods, returns the hug, and smiles. "I fixed one last thing for you."

Foster disappears into nothingness. Trevor sighs and sits down. His communicator chirps.

"Ensign Vong to Mr. Watts."

"Go ahead."

"Just got a message, they have decided to cancel the caning. It seems all of their canes have vanished."

Trevor laughs. "Cool."

He closes the communication and starts to lie back down when his door chime goes off.

Insert nifty Star Trek style doorbell sound here 

"Come in." He calls.

The doors slide open and Ami comes in. She looks at Trevor for a few moments.

Trevor returns the look.

After what seems like an eternity Ami runs to Trevor and embraces him.

"I should have waited." She whispers.

"It doesn't matter." Trevor sniffled, tears coming to his eyes. "What matters is now."

Ami nods as she and Trevor continue to embrace.

"She's starting to wake up." Serena called to Mina and Lita who were sitting in chairs in the corner of sickbay.

"Mmmm?" Raye softly mumbles.

"Raye?" Serena asks.

Raye blinks a couple of time. "Serena?" She weakly asks. "You're dead too?"

Serena looks around. "I'm dead?"

Lita rolls her eyes and walks over to Raye.

"You are not dead." Lita tells both Raye and Serena.

"What happened?" Raye asks.

Lita pulls up a seat and sits next to Raye's bed. Mina walks over and grins.

"When the life support went down, so did the jamming field. When the Crossroads realized you were still on board they transported you over." Mina explained.

"I remember passing out." Raye acknowledged.

"They had you on board within seconds after that. They quickly revived you, treated you for hypothermia, and now here you are." Mina finished.

"Was everyone else okay?" Raye asked.

Lita stood and smiled. "Thanks to you, we all made it back in once piece, no worse for the wear."

Mina smiled at Raye and started off.

"I have to return to the bridge. The Captain and Shampoo are on medical leave for a couple of days, so I'm running the show."

Raye grinned. "Better you than Serena."

Mina laughed. Lita laughed. Serena frowned, but then started to laugh. It was good to have her friend back.

"Well," Lita started. "You have another visitor, so we will leave you two alone."

Serena nodded, bent over and gave Raye a kiss on the forehead. "I'm glad you are alright." She smiled.

Raye weakly smiled back. "A little hull breech can't take me out."

Serena shook her head.

"No. I mean overall."

Raye did her best to raise an eyebrow. "Yeah, that's still to be determined."

Serena grins. "Just remember, we love you."

Raye nods to Serena as Lita motions for her to come with. Once the pair had left the room, Raye looked around a bit, trying to find her other visitor.

"You know –" Jeff states, from a darkened area of the room. "I could get used to your desk."

Raye laughs, but then grimaces. She glanced at her bio screen to find she had a broken rib.

"Well you can have it." Raye groans.

"Yeah." Jeff acknowledges. "I am glad that you seem to have tied up the loose ends."

Raye does her best to nod. "Most of them, but if we are heading back to Earth, I will have time to finish things off. I shouldn't be stuck in here for too much longer."

Jeff nods and walks over to Raye. He leans over and kisses her on the cheek.

"Raye Hino, you are a spectacular person. You have learned how to treat others. You may not be healed from your past experiences, but you have learned to deal with them."

Jeff starts to walk out of the room, but stops just short of the doors.

"And I do believe that you have learned the most important fact of life."

Jeff steps forward and out the sickbay doors.

_What goes around comes around._

Insert nifty Star Trek style doorbell sound here 

Shampoo looks up and towards the door from the book she was reading. She places her bookmark in it and hops off her bed. She then walks over and puts on a robe to cover the tank top and shorts she was wearing.

"Come in." She states.

The door opens up. Ranma and Akane are standing there, smiling at her.

Shampoo acknowledges them and walks back to the bed. She hops on it and scoots to the head of the bed, motioning for the pair to sit at the foot of her bed.

Ranma walks in first and has a seat. Akane follows and sets a covered dish down on the table before joining Ranma on the bed.

Shampoo cautiously eyes the dish. Akane groans a moment before letting out a chuckle.

"Don't worry, I gave one of my mom's recipes to the ships chef and had him cook it." Akane informs an obviously relieved Shampoo.

"Shampoo –" Ranma starts, but Akane interrupts him.

"Shampoo, Ranma told me what you said. Why you came over with him to help save me.

"Both Ranma and I realize how insensitive we were. We wanted to apologize, and to thank you."

Shampoo thought about what she wanted to say for a moment.

"Shampoo forgive you."

Ranma and Akane both smile at Shampoo.

"But," Shampoo starts. "Ranma and Akane must promise to Shampoo that you never keep any secrets again."

The pair both nod.

"Would you like to come with us?" Akane asks.

"The ship will be leaving for Earth in a couple of days, so we plan on going down to the planet for a picnic." Ranma finished.

Shampoo sighs. "That okay. Someone need to stay here and make sure ship doesn't fall apart."

Ranma nods and he and Akane stand. "If you change your mind, let me know." Akane tells her.

Shampoo nods and watches the pair as the hold hands and walk out of the room.

Shampoo turns and looks out the window at the planet they are now orbiting. She sighs and goes back to reading her book.

"Are you busy?" Ryouga asks, sticking his head into the captain's ready room where Mina was sitting.

"No." Mina states. "Come on in."

Ryouga nods and walks in, taking a seat across the deck from Mina.

"How are you feeling?" Mina asks.

"Good." Ryouga affirms. "Then again, who wouldn't feel good after a seventy seven hour nap?"

Mina chuckled. Ryouga blushed slightly.

"I suppose Commander Gosnell told you what happened?"

Mina laughed. She then shook her head at Ryouga. "Sorry, just laughing at Lita's name, not you."

Ryouga nods and allows Mina to regain her composure.

"Yeah, she did. You are still in love with her, yeah?"

Ryouga blushes some more.

"I've been in love with her since the first time I saw her. My whole life I have been obsessed with her."

Ryouga hangs his head. "And now, she isn't just out of reach, she's completely gone."

"I am not going to say I know how you feel, Ryouga." Mina said, spinning once in her chair. "But no one expects you to get over her overnight. But I think you are on the right track for moving on."

Ryouga looks up at Mina. "So what's the deal with us?"

Mina blushes. "Who says there has to be a deal?"

Ryouga doesn't quite understand and the look on his face reaffirms that.

Mina sighs. "I don't want to be in a relationship. You are still in love with Akane. Do you think anything serious would actually work out?"

"No."

"No." Mina agrees. "So, that being said, meet me in ten forward after your shift."

Ryouga nods and stands. "I know that this would help me move on." He chuckles.

Mina grins evilly. "Couldn't hurt."

"What a mess!" Tatewaki states, looking at what is left of the control center.

Kodachi walks up and nods in agreement.

The enormous hole in the side of the Kuno ship has been regenerated. All that is left is for the Kuno siblings to repair the control room.

Tatewaki has a seat on the floor as a Kuno drone goes walking by with a push broom.

Kodachi sits next to her brother. She sees a pile of dirt on the floor and calls to the drone.

"You missed a spot." She informs it. The drone looks at the pile of dirt and whips out a dustpan.

"I SHALL SMITE THEE!" It yells as it sweeps the dirt into the dustpan and dumps it into a garbage can.

Tatewaki leans back and looks at his sister.

"I guess it was a good thing that George set the ship to auto regenerate and then cloak. And that he also set the ship to automatically warp to our secret base."

Kodachi nods. "It's also good that the silly ones that invaded our great and noble cube didn't realize that even though we may be dead, once the regeneration cycle kicks in, we would be revived."

"Yes." Tatewaki adds. "Although I don't have any clue why we, the great Kuno Collective, would need to state all this information."

Kodachi shrugs. "Loose ends, maybe?"

Tatewaki nods and stands. "Once the repairs are done we shall begin to come up with our next and greatest plan!"

Kodachi hops to her feet. "We don't need George to do it either!"

"It would be pointless to need him. He seems to be blocking our every attempt to re-link to him and get his location!"

Kodachi cackles. "I guess he will just have to stay a Federation prisoner for the rest of his life!"

Kuno also cackles. "Sucks to be him!"

_Meanwhile, in the Sisko's brig..._

"Hey security guy."

The security officer standing guard in the brig walks up to George's cell.

"What?"  
"I think I am almost able to reestablish a link to the collective!" George gloats.

"We'll see about that!" The guard says, turning to another guard.

"Increase power to the dampening field."

The second guard complies. George frowns.

"Aw, you blocked the attempt."

The guard grins and walks off. George lies back down on his bunk and chuckles.

"Sucker." He quietly mumbles to himself as he closes his eyes to enjoy the silence.


	10. Epilogue

_EPILOGUE_

In Earth orbit, two weeks later...

"Ladies and gentlemen, Vice Admiral Scott Larson!" Genma states from the podium that's placed in the Sisko's cargo bay. A tall, fairly young man walks up to it and nods to Genma. Genma walks back to a set of chairs and takes his seat next to Happosai. Next to Happosai are several suits from the Federation council.

In the chairs next on the opposite side of the podium sit, from left to right, Ranma, Shampoo, Mina, Lita, Raye and Ryouga.

Admiral Larson clears his throat and smiles at the crowd of officers on the Sisko. He looks to his left, then right at the groups sitting there.

"During peacetime conflict is to be avoided at all costs." Larson starts. "But sometimes you have no choice to be involved in an armed confrontation. When that happens we ask that you do your best to quickly resolve the situation in an honorable fashion.

"The crew of the USS Sisko has done this in every single incident that they have been involved in. They have faced battles that no one can imagine being in. They have saved countless lives with the sacrifices that their crew has made.

"It gives me great honor as Admiral in command of sector two of the alpha quadrant to bestow the Starfleet Silver Cross for Distinguished Service to Captain Ranma Saotome and the entire crew of the USS Sisko."

Applause roars through the cargo bay as the officers all hoot and holler. Genma also applauds his son. Happosai claps as well, but it's more of a formal clap then it is a clap of approval.

Ranma stands and walks over to the podium where he accepts the award and poses for a couple of photos. Once all the photos had been taken, Ranma returns to his seat. Larson once again clears his throat which immediately causes the room to become silent.

"I also have the honor of commending one of the officers of the Sisko. Ensign Ryouga Hibiki, please step up here."

Ryouga looks around a second before realizing that the Admiral is talking about him. He quickly hops up and walks to the podium.

"Ensign, for your actions on the Kuno Cube, and from the recommendation of your commanding officers, I hereby promote you from Ensign to Lieutenant, Junior Grade."

The crowd roars its approval again as the Admiral pins a second pip on the collar of Ryouga's dress whites. Ryouga smiles and shakes the Admirals hand. After posing for a couple of photos he returns to his seat, beaming.

Again, Larson clears his throat and shuts everyone up.

"Due to the Sisko's valiant service it has been decided that she is not up to the everyday tasks of a starship.

"It's a new galaxy, with new, unique threats. Therefore, let it be known that on this day, star date 60206, the Federation Council has authorized Starfleet to create a Special Operations Unit, to be known as Neo. I hereby give this duty to the USS Sisko."

Quiet murmurs go throughout the cargo bay. Ranma stands and walks to the admiral as he is handed a PADD.

"Captain." Larson states. "You are hereby requested and ordered to take command of Operation Neo. While here your ship will receive a refit and you will be equipped with new, classified weapons and devices to help you in your future missions.

"Your first duty though will be to place someone in command of a detachment of special operations officers that will be assigned to your ship."

Ranma looks at his crew, then back to the Admiral.

"With all due respect, sir." Ranma starts. "I would request that any special operations team be assembled from my current crew."

Larson looked at Genma and Happosai. Genma seemed to be giving Ranma that 'shut up, dumbass' look. Happosai was grinning from ear to ear at the royal shellacking that Ranma was about to receive from Admiral Larson.

Larson looked back to Ranma who if he was afraid, wasn't showing it.

"Very well." Larson stated.

Happosai fell over. Genma grinned.

"Who do you wish to command this team?" Larson asked.

Ranma stepped up to the podium.

"I had the unfortunate duty of receiving a letter of resignation from my ships counselor, Lt. Commander Raye Hino.

"I have not known her for very long, but after talking to her friends and knowing that she almost died saving members of this crew, myself included, from the Kuno cube, I have no choice but to accept her resignation from her post and place her in command of this task force."

Mina and Lita hug their friend in congratulations. The rest of the crew cheers loudly.

"Thank god." One crew member whispers to another. "I don't think I could handle another session where I left feeling worse than I did when I showed up!"

The other crew member nods in agreement.

Raye steps up to the podium. Ranma steps aside as the Admiral sizes up Raye.

"I hereby place you in command of Special Operations Team Neo, and promote you to the rank of Commander." Larson smiled, removing the hollow pip from her collar and placing a full one on.

Raye smiles at the Admiral and shakes his hand. She then smiles at Ranma.

"Thank you." She softly states before taking her seat.

"Captain, Commander, I will need a list of the officers you want on the special ops team. They will then need to disembark for six weeks for training."

Ranma nods.

"Good. Now, you guys have deserved it, so I hereby place everyone, with the exception of the officers that will be needed for training, on shore leave.

"So, lets all get drunk and play ping pong!" Larson grins.

The crowd all cheers. Shampoo stands up.

"ATTENTION!" She yells.

Everyone snaps to attention and shuts up.

"Dismissed." Larson orders.

The occupants of the cargo bay slowly trickle out. Soon all that is left is Ranma, Akane and Genma.

"So boy, I am glad to see that you finally grew some balls and married Akane."

Ranma growls at his father. Akane just grins.

"Yes, I did." Ranma grumbles. "Maybe someday you will too and go home to Mom."

Genma starts flailing his arms as Akane and Ranma start to walk off.

"HOW DARE YOU SPEAK TO YOUR FATHER LIKE THAT YOU INGRATE!" Genma yells, running after them.

"I AM AN ADMIRAL!" He adds.

..._to be continued_


End file.
